ft 



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IWLA*a^ 



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INCLINED PLANE UP MOUNT PI6GAH. 



[See p. 101. 



GUIDE-BOOK 



OF THE 



CENTRAL RAILROAD 



OF 



NEW JERSEY, 



AND 



ITS CONNECTIONS THROUGH 



THE COAL-FIELDS OF PENNSYLVANIA. 




NEW YORK: 

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 

FEABK1IN SQUARE. . 

1864. 



V\53 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year one thousand 
eight hundred and sixty-four, by 

HARPER & BROTHERS, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Southern District of 

New York. 



ILLUSTRATIONS, 



Inclined Plane up Mount Pisgah Frontispiece. V 

Washington Rock Page 24 

View from High Bridge 27 L/ 

Delaware Water Gap, from the Kittatinny House 31 

View up the Delaware from Sunset Rock 36i/ 

Roaring Brook Falls 40 

Capture of Frances Slocum by the Indians 41 

Railroad Bridge at Scranton t 44^ 

Scranton 45 

Coal-cracker — exterior 52 

Coal-cracker — interior 53 

Queen Esther's Rock ...-. 59 

Wyoming Monument 60 

Wyoming Valley, from Prospect Rock 64 

The Susquehanna at Wilkesbarre 67 

Northumberland 72 

The Susquehanna above Harrisburg - 76 

Iron Hills at Cornwall 81 

Reading 83 

View on the Lehigh River at White Haven 88 

View from the top of Buck Mountain 90 

Mauch Chunk from Mount Pisgah 95 

The Switch-back 100 

View at Bethlehem ••• 109 

Easton 113 



"""^""^ 




MAP OF THE 

COAL FIELD EXCURSIONS 

OF CENTRAL R.R. OF N. J., 

AND ITS CONNECTIONS. 




ILLUSTRATED GUIDE-BOOK 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 



I. 

INTRODUCTION". 

The time has gone by when it could be said of any 
country that its sea-board cities must, of necessity hold 
a monopoly of its grandeur. This is due to railroads, 
which have relieved inland towns, and even the tiniest 
villages, from their former servile dependence upon the 
cities of the coast, and established between the sea and 
the land a complex universal system of mutual ministra- 
tion. On this account, there seems to be a decidedly 
democratic feature about railroads, as indeed there is 
about every improvement of modern civilization. Met- 
ropolitan cities are not made less, but the whole country 
is brought up to their level. Inland towns and villages 
already existing have opened up to them a thousand av- 
enues of prosperity from which they must else have been 
excluded ; and, besides this, numbers are tempted into 
existence, until the country is densely populated with 
happy communities. 

In a country so vast as our own, these considerations 
have an especial weight. Literally it is true that the 
velocity of steam is imparted to the progressive move- 



8 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

ment of this generation. All speed — moral, intellectual, 
physical — takes its gradation from that which is possible 
in locomotion ; and it must be so. Our three and a quar- 
ter millions of acres have only four and a half thousands 
of miles of coast. Now, as matters were carried on an- 
ciently, it would have taken a thousand years simply to 
colonize this outer rim of the United States, while the 
vast interior would have remained thousands of years 
more in its wilderness state. It is the steam- whistle 
that has cut down the forest trees, that has opened the 
coal mines of Pennsylvania, that has plowed the limitless 
garden of the West, that has unveiled the natural re- 
sources of every portion of the country, that has given 
it its thirty millions of people, and that has hurried on 
to maturity its political crises and revolutions ; and all 
this not quite two centuries and a half after the landing 
of the Puritans at Plymouth ! A locomotive will not 
move with a bad idea behind it, but put a good one there, 
and all the powers of evil, all the impediments of nature, 
can not hinder its onward course. It was commerce 
that destroyed the feudal system of the fifteenth centu- 
ry, and the power of steam is now sweeping away every 
vestige of the barbarism of this nineteenth century. Es- 
tablish an intimate system of commercial communication 
between the East and the West, and between the North 
and the South, and it is inevitable that the whole coun- 
try must rise to a level with whatever portion of it is 
most highly civilized and enlightened. This must be the 
material basis of any union between the states that shall 
have permanent value. 

But the work that has been begun by railroads in this 
country has been only just begun. The future it is im- 
possible not to contemplate with audacity. The tourist 
of to-day finds his entire route lined with little villages, 
the greater part of which have not yet seen six years. 
The beauties which strike the eye are furnished by the 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 9 

hand of Nature, and are rarely connected with the more 
mature products of human art — such, for instance, as are 
afforded by the architecture of long-standing cities. But 
in one or two generations mighty strides will have been 
taken by human art ; instead of incipient villages, the 
tourist will on all sides behold flourishing cities, with 
their rich and beautiful surroundings. Then it will not 
be alone the stately river, the cleft mountain — not alone 
the tunnel and viaduct that shall arrest his attention, 
but also the picturesque canton, the finely and tastefully 
constructed street, and the stately memorials of historic 
events, transcending in interest the heroic deeds of the 
Revolution, or the bloody episodes of early Indian war- 
fare. 



II. 

HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE ROAD AND ITS CONNECTIONS. 

The Central Railroad of New Jersey, besides being 
the principal avenue by which the products of Pennsyl- 
vania are conveyed to New York, is also one of the most 
important routes to the West. Doubtless there is not 
a single road in the country which, in the two following 
aspects, can be said to rival it. In the first place, no 
road traversing so short a distance is so indispensable ; 
and, secondly, there is none which can equal it in the pic- 
turesque attractions which it opens up to tourists. 

The history of the road is full of interest, and particu- 
larly for this reason, viz., the encouragement, or rather, 
we should say, the irresistible temptation which it offer- 
ed to other railroad lines, inducing them to complete the 
connections for which it, acting as pioneer, had made the 
all-important preparation. 

The road from Elizabethport to Somerville was built 
by the Elizabethtown and Somerville Railroad Company, 

A 2 



10 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE . 

under a charter granted in 1831. The company was 
poor, and the road was opened first from Elizabethport 
to Elizabeth, then to Plainfield,then to Bound Brook, and 
finally, in 1842, to Somerville, by a desperate effort, re- 
sulting in the failure of the company and the foreclosure 
of the mortgage upon the road. The road being sold in 
1846, the strap rail was taken up by the new organiza- 
tion, the track relaid with a heavy rail, and preparations 
made for a large business. A new company was char- 
tered in 1847 to extend the road from Somerville to Eas- 
ton, under the name of "The Somerville and Easton Kail- 
road Company." The same year the part between Som- 
erville and White House was put under contract, and in 
the fall of 1848 was opened to the latter place. In 1849 
authority was given to the Somerville and Easton Kail- 
road Company to purchase the Elizabethtown and Som- 
erville Kailroad, and the name of the consolidated com- 
pany was changed to " The Central Railroad Company 
of New Jersey." This was carried into effect in 1850, 
the existing roads brought under one ownership, and 
immediately thereafter, in the spring of the same year, 
the remainder of the route to Phillipsburg, on the Dela- 
ware River, opposite Easton, was put under contract. 
The portion to Clinton was opened in May, 1852, and 
the entire road in July of the same year. The railroad 
bridge over the Delaware River belongs to the Lehigh 
Valley Railroad Company. In 1860 authority was given 
to extend the Central Road eastward from a point above 
Elizabethport to Jersey City, and this has now (1864) 
been done, though the traveler will observe much re- 
maining to be accomplished. 

In 1855 the Lehigh Valley Railroad was opened from 
Easton, first to Allentown, and then to Mauch Chunk, 
the centre of the Lehigh Valley coal region. During this 
same year also, the Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western 
Railroad completed the line from New Hampton (its 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 11 

point of junction with the Central Railroad of New Jer- 
sey) to Scranton, the centre of the Lackawanna coal re- 
gion, and a convenient depot for the coal transportation 
from the Wyoming Valley eastward. The road from 
Scranton northerly to the Erie Railroad had been al- 
ready built. 

Through these two roads the products of the richest 
anthracite mines of Pennsylvania were brought to the 
Central Railroad of New Jersey for transportation to 
the metropolis. The Lackawanna connection requiring 
a six-foot gauge, the Central Railroad company, at an 
early period, anticipated this necessity by laying a third 
rail to Hampton Junction. The common gauge of the 
Central Road is four feet eight and a half inches, which 
is uniform with that of the Lehigh Valley Road and its 
connections, as well as of the country generally. 

The value of these connecting lines may be appreciated 
from the fact that, during the first year after their com- 
pletion, the business of the Central Road was nearly 
doubled. During the second year, the Lehigh Valley 
Road brought for transportation 86,355 tons of coal, and 
the Lackawanna Road 224,090 tons, an increase of 33 per 
cent, over the corresponding amounts of the previous 
year. 

In 1858 the East Pennsylvania Railroad was opened 
between Allentown and Reading, establishing a direct 
line, with unbroken gauge, to Harrisburg, Pittsburg, and 
the West. 

These are the immediate connections of the Central 
Road, all of which are of incalculable value. Certain it 
is that no road could possibly have a geographical posi- 
tion more favorable than this one for numerous and im- 
portant connections. We ought to mention the fact also 
that from Somerville a branch road has been recently 
built to Flemington, which opens up a new section of 
country, and incidentally gives another route to Phila- 
delphia. 



12 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 



III. 

GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE ROUTES. 

This route presents to tourists two important advan- 
tages not realized in nearly so high a degree upon any 
other. The first of these — the most important to the 
lovers of the beautiful — is the variety of natural scenery; 
the second advantage is the intimate connections of the 
route, at every point, with the natural resources of the 
country through which it conducts, and with those mar- 
velous mechanical appliances by means of which these 
resources are developed. The beauties of nature and the 
utilities of man vie with each other for the over-master- 
ing interest. 

The trunk route — that is, that of the Central Road it- 
self — extends across the central portion of New Jersey, 
from New York, or rather from Jersey City, to Easton, 
in the State of Pennsylvania. In this way the finest por- 
tion of New Jersey is traversed, the low, marshy flats 
toward the south being avoided, as also the barren hills 
toward the northwest. The road leads through a suc- 
cession of alluvial valleys, containing the very richest 
land in the state, and increasing both in beauty and fer- 
tility as one approaches the borders of Pennsylvania. 
Who that has looked upon the Musconetcong Valley 
from New Hampton will ever forget the scene or its 
suggestions ? 

But it is only after entering Pennsylvania (the whole 
eastern half of which is traversed by connecting lines) 
that one can fairly appreciate the extent and variety of 
scenery which the route affords. Mountain ranges of 
characteristic grandeur, cleft here and there by abrupt 
fissures to their very base, through which stately rivers 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 13 

lead their pomp of waters to the sea ; rich and beautiful 
ft valleys, sometimes so narrow, and, withal, so picturesque, 
as to remind the traveler of Swiss cantons among the 
Alps, and sometimes allowed a broader and longer reach 
by the yielding mountain ranges that inclose them ; for- 
ests that still retain the rugged aspect of their primeval 
wilderness, and romantic cascades. The mention of 
these features but feebly suggests the reality as seen by 
the eye. The reader must actually visit the Delaware 
Water Gap, he must himself climb the Pocono range, he 
must follow the Susquehanna in its winding course for a 
hundred miles, he must himself look upon the Valley of 
the Wyoming, with its tragic memorials and its beauti- 
ful villages, he must see with his own eyes the rich Val- 
ley of Lebanon, he must be drawn up the inclined planes 
of Mount Pisgah at Mauch Chunk, he must actually re- 
alize these things in his own experience, for it is beyond 
our power adequately to describe them. The sketches 
too, from the hand of the artist, good as they are, but 
suggest an outline of the real scene, destitute of the rich 
charm and body of reality which color imparts, as also 
of the element of vastness, so prominent in most of the 
scenes delineated. 

To the scientific tourist there is a distinctive attrac- 
tion connected with traveling in Pennsylvania generally, 
viz., the fact that in a geological sense this state is liter- 
ally the keystone of the Union, for in its peculiar forma- 
tions is to be found the key to the geology of the whole 
country. It was in this state that the first ridges of the 
Appalachian range were thrown up, which were follow- 
ed at intervals by other parallel ridges to the southward. 
There is also this additional peculiarity : that in Penn- 
sylvania, more than in any other state, the coal measures 
have been preserved, having been simply opened up by 
the natural convulsions incident to the upheaval of 
mountain ranges, and not, as is generally the case, en- 
tirely swept away by an excess of violence. 



14 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

It is to this peculiarity that Eastern Pennsylvania 
owes its rich treasury of anthracite coal, from which it 
derives the greater portion of its wealth. These an- 
thracite coal-fields are accessible through two important 
connections of the Central Road, viz., the Lehigh Valley, 
and the Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western Railroad, 
as previously stated. Of course to the tourist there is a 
greater charm, as regards novelty, in the mechanical de- 
velopments of resources of this nature than is the case in 
the ordinary appliances of agricultural industry, and for 
this reason, added to many others, the route which is un- 
der consideration is eminently fitted for the purposes of 
excursionists. 

Considered in this connection, the route naturally di- 
vides itself into two — a longer one, extending nearly to 
the southern border of Pennsylvania, and a shorter one, 
included within the limits of the anthracite coal region. 
By the former of these we are conveyed as far as Hamp- 
ton Junction, along the Central Road, where we take the 
Lackawanna Road through "Warren County to the Wa- 
ter Gap, and from thence over the Pocono Mountain to 
Scranton. From this point, over the Lackawanna and 
Bloomsburg Road, we proceed through the Wyoming 
Valley to Northumberland, where we take the Northern 
Central Railroad to Harrisburg, the southern limit of 
our route, from which we return through Reading, Al- 
lentown, and Easton to New York, over the Philadel- 
phia and Reading, the East Pennsylvania, the Lehigh 
Valley, and the Central Railroad of New Jersey. 

The shorter route only takes us as far down the Wyo- 
ming Valley as Kingston, near Wilkesbarre, from which 
latter place we either take the Penn Haven and White 
Haven Railroad to Mauch Chunk direct, or else are con- 
veyed by stage to the depot of the Lehigh and Susque- 
hanna Railroad, from which we proceed to White Ha- 
ven, take the stage up Buck Mountain to the village of 



CENTRAL EAILEOAD OF NEW JEESEY. 15 

Eckley, from which, by the Hazleton and Beaver Mead- 
ow Railroads, we are conveyed to Mauch Chunk. After 
having availed ourselves of the peculiar facilities here af- 
forded us of visiting the mines in the vicinity by means 
of the inclined planes, the gravity roads, and the switch- 
back, we proceed on our way to Allentown over the Le- 
high Valley Road, and thence by the Central to New 
York as before. This latter route makes us thoroughly 
acquainted with the coal-fields, and includes features of 
greater novelty than the one previously described, though 
not taking in so large an extent of territory, nor so rich 
an agricultural region as does that through Harrisburg. 
We ought to add that the Central Railroad Company 
of New Jersey have made such arrangements with their 
connecting lines as to give the tourist every desirable fa- 
cility in taking these excursions, making the expenses of 
the whole course much less than it would be according 
to ordinary rates, and giving him, besides, a large margin 
of leisure time, by issuing tickets good for two weeks — 
twice the time absolutely required for the longer of the 
two excursions. 



IV. 

NEW YOEK TO HAMPTON JUNCTION. 

Having thus directed attention to the general route, 
we are now prepared to go over it more specifically 
with the traveler. Let our time for setting out be morn- 
ing ; and, in addition to this, let us suggest that, after 
crossing the ferry from the New York station to the de- 
p6t of the Central Railroad on the Jersey City side, at 
what was late the waters of Communipaw Bay, the 
traveler should at least, as far as to Elizabeth, take a 
seat on the left-hand side of the cars, for the sake of ob- 
taining a finer view of New York Bay ; afterward, until 



16 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

he reaches Hampton, he will find the other side more fa- 
vorable, as commanding a better view of the long, low 
range of mountains which in this portion of our course 
we have directly at our right, and which form the line 
of demarcation from the level lands to the eastward. 

Hitherto the eastern terminus of the road has been at 
Elizabethport, but the necessities of business, and the 
eminent prosperity of the company, have demanded a 
continuation of the railroad to New York. Since 1860 
the company's passenger cars have been drawn over the 
New Jersey Railroad from Elizabeth to Jersey City by 
the engines of the latter road, while the freight business 
has continued to be done by boats from Elizabethport ; 
but now an independent line has been built from Eliza- 
beth to New York, running through a very different 
country, and giving the tourist some very marked ad- 
vantages in the matter of natural scenery. 

Jersey City, our starting-point after crossing the fer- 
ry, was first incorporated as a city in 1 820. It is situated 
directly opposite to New York, on the right bank of the 
Hudson. The township of Van Vorst was included in 
the city limits in 1850. The city, which projects into the 
river, is handsomely laid out with broad streets crossing 
each other at right angles. It is supplied with water 
from the Passaic River, and has otherwise all the im- 
provements belonging to the metropolis itself. Its pub- 
lic schools for the benefit of either sex are of unusual ex- 
cellence. The business of the city is very large, and rap- 
idly increasing. Among the principal things to be no- 
ticed in this connection are the flint-glass works, the pot- 
tery, and the extensive lumber-yards. Its commercial 
facilities are also very great. The Curiard R. M. Steam- 
ship Company have their wharf and store-houses here, 
and, besides the Central, other railroads have also their 
central depot at the ferry landing. The Central Road is 
building a beautiful and commodious depot of its own at 



CENTRAL RAIER0AD OF NEW JERSEY. 17 

this extremity of its line. Besides these railroads, the 
Morris Canal, 101 miles in length, furnishes another ave- 
nue of communication connecting the Hudson with the 
Delaware. 

From Jersey City, as the reader knows, a narrow pe- 
ninsula extends for seven miles to Bergen Point, opposite 
Staten Island, separating New York Bay from Newark 
Bay. It is along this peninsula that our route proceeds. 

In the first place, however, we cross a portion of New 
York Bay, having at our right hand Communipaw Cove, 
now being rapidly transformed into land, and upon our 
left the Dutch settlement at Communipaw, as old as New 
York, and celebrated by Washington Irving — the inhab- 
itants of which are said still to vote for Washington as 
President. Farther to the left we have a full open view 
of the bay through its whole extent. The road was 
here supported on spiles, before filling in, for a distance 
of nearly a mile and a half, until we strike the peninsula 
again. It is unnecessary even to allude to the character- 
istic beauty of the bay as seen from so favorable a situa- 
tion, and the situation is hardly less favorable at any 
point of the ride to Bergen Point. 

Soon we pass the New York Bay Cemetery, about 
three miles w T est of Jersey City, and enter a hilly, undu- 
lating country, with many a beautiful villa scattered here 
and there upon chosen sites. The country is in a very 
good state of cultivation, and the pleasant farm-house is 
still no unfrequent sight, though the rise in the value of 
land and the demand for residences is fast enriching, and, 
at the same time, removing the natives. Thus for four 
and a half miles until we reach 

Saltersville, a flourishing little village. Before quite 
reaching this place we have some excellent views of the 
bay. The Narrows appear to the eye in very distinct 
outline with the two forts — one on either side — which 
command the gates of the Atlantic. To the left, in the 



18 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

distance, extends the devious coast of Long Island, while 
the more regular shores of Stat en Island stretch away 
on the right. 

Many of the business men of New York find here 
pleasant country residences at as short a distance from 
their offices in the city as if they lived no higher up than 
Thirtieth Street in New York itself. The Morris Canal 
passes through the neighborhood, and has hitherto been 
a valuable medium for freight transportation. It is 
twice crossed by this road. A little west of Saltersville 
is 

Centkeville, a village already advanced to a good 
stage of growth, and rapidly increasing. From this place 
a ride of two miles brings us to 

Bayonne, chiefly noted for its beautiful country resi- 
dences, and likely to rise in importance. 

Port Johnston, on the left, heretofore known as North- 
east Harbor, is considered the best harbor in the vicinity 
of New York, and has been selected by the company for 
a coal-station, calculated to eclipse Port Richmond or 
any other coal depot. Here they have secured a large 
tract of water-front and extensive piling -ground, and 
have commenced the erection of wharves, which will be 
rapidly continued. The water is excellent, and the nav- 
igation unimpeded in any way. A few years will show 
a marvelous change in those now quiet salt meadows. 

Bergen Point is the southern extremity of Hudson 
County, between Newark Bay and the Kills. This is an 
eminently favorite resort for many from the city, even 
more so than the rest of the peninsula, and the wisdom 
shown in the selection is commendable, for, besides its 
situation upon the sea-board, it has also advantages rare- 
ly incident to such a situation. The vegetation is not 
stinted, nor the soil a sand-bank ; on the contrary, it has 
roads of uncommon excellence, leading through very 
beautiful wood-lands, so that for delightful drives no 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 19 

finer situation could be chosen, while the views are va- 
ried, lying, as it does, between New York Bay on the 
east, the Kills and Staten Island on the south, and New- 
ark Bay on the west. 

From Bergen Point we proceed westward across New- 
ark Bay. Here, as across New York Bay, though for a 
greater distance, the road is carried on a pile bridge. 
This takes us across the central and widest portion of 
the bay, the distance being 9000 feet, commanding fine 
views up and down the bay. The pivot draw-bridge is 
a fine structure of iron, spanning two openings of seven- 
ty-five feet each in the clear, and resting on a solid cir- 
cular masonry pier. This pier was built by Sidney Dil- 
lon & Co., on a new plan, interesting to the scientific or 
practical reader. A foundation was prepared by driv- 
ing piles as close together as possible in the bottom of 
the bay where the pier was to be built. These were then 
sawed off thirty-five feet under water, at the level of the 
mud, by an ingenious arrangement of machinery, leaving 
a perfectly level surface. A masonry pier was then built 
upon an octagonal wooden platform, and within a circu- 
lar wooden caisson, the whole being kept in position over 
this foundation by guide-piles, and .supported by screws 
passing from the wooden platform to the timbers on the 
tops of the guide-piles. As the masonry advanced and 
the weight increased, the screws were turned by machin- 
ery and the mass gradually lowered, till it finally rested 
upon the foundation prepared. It was then an easy mat- 
ter to withdraw the screws and other apparatus, remove 
the caisson, and riprap the bottom of the pier. The of- 
fice of this timber platform and wooden caisson was to 
give buoyancy to the mass. The pier was built in a few 
months, and at a cost of $34,000. 

Having crossed the bay, we have now on the left the 
flourishing sea-port village of 

Elizabethport. This place is within the corporate 



20 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

limits of the City of Elizabeth, but is yet worthy of sepa- 
rate mention from its position, as well as its having been 
so long the eastern terminus of the road. It is situated 
on Staten Island Sound, near its junction with Newark 
Bay, ten miles from New York, and one and a half from 
Elizabeth. It is accessible to vessels of 300 tons bur- 
den, and its connection with the railroad has made it an 
important business centre. The steam-boat route from 
this place to New York, fourteen miles long, is still kept 
open, though no longer used by the railroad. The wa- 
ter-front, which previous to 1852 was a salt marsh in- 
habited only by musquitoes, is now lined with wharves 
from which immense quantities of iron, coal, and lumber 
are shipped to eastern ports. The new wharves at Ber- 
gen Point are diverting the coal trade from this point, 
but as fast as room is thereby made it is filled up by the 
rushing in of other business. 

The next stopping-place is at Elizabeth, situated on 
Elizabeth Creek, a favorite resort for many who, doing 
business in the city, desire a residence in the country. 
It is the county seat of Union County, and, including the 
Port, has a population numbering over 16,000. Until re- 
cently, when it became a city, it was called Elizabeth- 
town, and was commonly known as the " Old BoroughP 
Its settlement as a town dates back to August, 1664, and 
its charter as the " Borough of Elizabeth" to February 
8th, 1739. Governor Carteret made thfs the place of 
his residence in 1664, and it was for several years the 
capital of the province. The sessions of the Supreme 
Court were held here until 1682, and here were all the 
public buildings, though even tradition does not now 
point out the site on which they stood. Its name has 
been thoroughly incorporated with the history of the 
country — especially does it stand prominent in the times 
of the Revolution. This place furnished as large a num- 
ber of soldiers for the army of Washington as any other 



CENTRAL EA1LE0AD OF NEW JERSEY. 21 

in the land, in proportion to its size. Nowhere was found 
a loftier and more self-sacrificing spirit of patriotic loyalty. 
With a very few infamous exceptions, there were no trai- 
tors to tread the streets and breathe the air of the ancient 
borough. A list of the good and patriotic men whose 
names can never die would fill pages. We need only al- 
lude to the Ogdens, the Daytons, the Barbers, the Wil- 
liamsons, the Chetwoods, whose descendants still hold 
honorable positions here. The names of Dickinson, Spen- 
cer, Belcher, Caldwell, Austin, Kollock, McDowell, and 
Murray will not soon be forgotten. The mansion of Gen- 
eral Scott still attracts the attention of the visitor, espe- 
cially when occupied by the venerable hero, as it often is 
during the summer. A nursery of large extent, well stock- 
ed with fruit and ornamental shade-trees, long known as 
"Reid's Nursery," but now owned by Mr. Buchanan, fur- 
nishes another attraction to the stranger as well as the 
resident not to be overlooked. Elizabeth is not remark- 
able as a manufacturing city. Though the oil-cloth facto- 
ries here are the most extensive in the world, still there 
are but few manufactories compared with other cities of 
the same size. It is chiefly noted for its excellent morals, 
cultivated society, numerous schools of a high order, and 
pleasant, healthful location. We are informed by the 
oldest physician here that there has been no epidemic 
within the town for at least thirty years. It contains, 
including Elizabethport, five Presbyterian churches, four 
Protestant Episcopal, four Methodist Episcopal, three 
Roman Catholic, one Baptist, one Congregational, and 
one Primitive Methodist (colored.) It has three classic- 
al and select male schools, two female seminaries, and 
several smaller select schools for both sexes, besides two 
very large public schools. There is no town or city in 
the state that has superior advantages for education. By 
means of the Central Railroad of New Jersey and the 
New Jersey Railroad it has access to New York about 



22 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

every half hour during the day, and several times during 
the night. These advantages render it one of the most 
desirable locations for residence that can be found in the 
vicinity of New York. We find it recorded in the ar- 
chives here, that "in 1739 the Rev. Mr. Whitfield left 
New York at noon for Elizabethtown. He reached 
here in safety the next day time enough to dine with 
the Rev. Jonathan Dickinson, and to preach in the after- 
noon." Now the same journey occupies about forty-five 
minutes. It is worthy of note that the College of New 
Jersey was founded here in 1746. The Rev. Jonathan 
Dickinson was the first president. It was afterward re- 
moved to Newark, and thence to Princeton, where it is 
now one of the most flourishing in the land. Though 
for a long period the " Old Borough" seemed to have 
been " finished," yet during the past ten years a spirit 
of enterprise has been aroused, beautiful dwellings and 
country seats have been rapidly multiplied, churches, 
public buildings, and streets have been improved, and 
we venture to predict that within the next ten years it 
will outstrip all its neighbors in increase of prosperity 
and wealth. 

Till the opening of the route we have so far been de- 
scribing, the tourist was carried from Jersey City to Eliz- 
abeth over the New Jersey Railroad, which here inter- 
sects the Central Railroad, through the extensive and 
flourishing city of 

Newark, on the west bank of the Passaic River, 
three miles above Newark Bay. It is the real, though 
not the nominal capital of the state, and is the most 
populous and flourishing place in New Jersey. Its site 
is a fertile plain, somewhat elevated above the river, 
and rising toward the west, affording excellent sites for 
residences. The court-house, in the more elevated por- 
tion of the city, is built in the Egyptian style of arch- 



CENTRAL EAILE0AD OF NEW JEESEY. 23 

itecture. The city has extensive manufactures, from 
which are produced leather and India-rubber of various 
fabrics, carriages, wagons, and railroad cars, saddlery, 
machinery, jewelry, paper-hangings, cutlery, soap, can- 
dles, etc. Prominent among these manufactories is the 
extensive paint factory of the New Jersey Zinc Compa- 
ny. Newark has also important commercial facilities, 
which are being every day brought more fully into use. 
The river up to this point is navigable for light craft. 
The Morris Canal passes through the city. 

Leaving Elizabeth, we come in two miles to Mulford, 
as yet only a railway station, but with every prospect 
of growth. The country now begins to be more varied 
in scenery ; the range of hills at our right is from this 
point directly at our side, permitting us to look up its 
beautiful slopes upon many a rich farm and farm-house. 
Two miles more and we come to 

Cvanemlle, a small village nineteen miles from New 
York. 

Westfield, three miles farther on, is a flourishing 
town, having about 2000 inhabitants ; the surface toward 
the south is level, but is hilly on the north. Great im- 
provements have been recently made ; the town has tak- 
en a fresh start, has built a new church, and promises to 
become a rich and prosperous borough. Two miles' 
ride brings us through 

Scotch Plains. The old village from which the sta- 
tion is named is picturesquely situated about a mile from 
the road, at the foot of and running up on the slope of 
the hilly range which we have on the north. Despite 
its name, the face of the country is here much broken 
and diversified, and fine sites for residences abound. 
From this w T e are rapidly borne to the important town 
of 

Plainfield, twenty-six miles from New York. The 



24 



GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 



railroad passes through the west part of the town, which 
is situated in the midst of a fertile country, drained on 
the east side by Green River, and on the west by a branch 
of the Rah way. The town was set off from Westfield 
in 1847, and has a population of about 3000 souls. The 
Opheleton Seminary for young ladies gives the place an 
additional attraction to New Yorkers, and the climate is 
the most favorable. 

The tourist, after leaving Plainfield, should be on the 
sharp look-out for Washington Rock, an object of es- 
pecial inter- 
est from its 
connection with 
the Revolutionary 
contest. It is 1 to 
be seen on the right hand, 
near the top of the range 
of hills on that side, and 
about half an hour's drive 
from Plainfield. . From this 
point it was that General Wash- 
ington, when hard pushed by 
Cornwallis across the state toward 
the Delaware, was in the habit of 
making observations upon the move- 
ments of the enemy. The view from 
this lofty crag is one of the most 
commanding that can be obtained 
in the whole state, which is, in great 
measure, due to the fact that toward 
the sea-board there is no intervening 
range of hills to intercept the pros- 
pect. Elizabeth, Amboy, Rahway, Newark, and, under 
a favorable state of atmosphere, even the shipping in 
New York Bay, may be clearly seen from this point. To 
aid the reader in fixing the locality, it may be of use to 




WASHINGTON EOOK. 



CENTEAL EAILEOAD OF NEW JEESEY. 25 

suggest that a considerable clearing has been made about 
this object of interest, making it distinctly visible from 
the cars ; and, besides this, a hotel has been located in 
the immediate vicinity. The abrupt feature of the rock, 
as given in the sketch, can only be appreciated from a 
nearer view. 

JVeiv Market, twenty-nine miles from New York, is a 
small station, of little importance except that it is situa- 
ted in the midst of a country rich in agricultural prod- 
ucts. Five miles farther on is 

Bound Beook, one of the oldest towns in New Jer- 
sey. Here we come upon the valley of the Raritan, at 
which point also the Delaware and Raritan Canal touches. 
All the way from Plainfield the traveler can not fail to 
observe that he is continually entering upon a more fruit- 
ful district, for we are now moving directly into the 
midst of a series of rich alluvial valleys, which reach one 
after another entirely across the state into Pennsylvania 
and even to Tennessee. From Bound Brook we at once 
rise gradually and approach 

Someeville, the shire town of Somerset County, thir- 
ty-eight miles from New York. The town is situated on 
the north bank of the Raritan River, along the banks of 
which are beautiful drives for many miles, which form a 
great attraction during the summer. It is a tastefully- 
built town, laid out in a highly-cultivated country. The 
river, the beautiful valley, and the many church spires 
of the town, make the view from the mountain-side par- 
ticularly attractive. Copper ore has been found within 
a short distance. From Somerville, as we said at the in- 
troduction, a railroad (called the South Branch Railroad) 
has been constructed to Flemington, which will give a 
short route to Philadelphia. At Flemington it connects 
with the railroad to Lambertville, on the Delaware ; and 
at this latter point a southern connection is made, by 
means of the Belvidere-Delaware road, to Trenton and 

B 



26 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

Philadelphia, while a northern route conducts to Easton 
and Belvidere. Thus will Somerville, apart from its nat- 
ural attractions, become a prominent centre of interest 
on account of its important position as respects commer- 
cial intercourse. 

Martian village, one and a half miles farther on, is real- 
ly but a part of Somerville, and has all its advantages. 
It has also a valuable water-power, the water being 
brought from the Raritan River through a canal three 
miles long. A number of manufactories of various kinds 
have been erected, but the lack of money in the Water- 
power Company, and in those who have built these mills, 
has prevented the success that was looked for. There 
is here a fine opening for capital and enterprise combined 
(not the latter alone), and Raritan will yet be classed 
among the wealthy manufacturing villages of New Jersey. 

Four miles farther on, up the valley (we say up be- 
cause the Raritan River, formed by the union of its two 
branches near Somerville, runs eastward, emptying into 
Raritan Sound at Amboy), we pass through a rich coun- 
try to 

North Branch, named from the north branch of the 
river. After passing through 

White House, a little village forty-seven miles from 
New York, we soon reach 

Lebanon, a fine farming district, three miles farther 
ahead. From this point the country becomes rolling. 
The limestone hills — from which the land derives no small 
measure of its richness — now present to the eye their ex- 
quisitely rounded forms. It is impossible to give an idea 
of the change which has passed over this whole district 
since the construction of the Central Railroad. Beauti- 
ful houses have been erected, tasteful grounds laid out, 
and to such an extent have the agricultural resources of 
the region been developed, that land has within a few 
years risen from $50 per acre to $150. 



CENTEAL EAILE0AD OF NEW JEESEY. 



27 



Clinton, two miles from Lebanon and fifty-four from 
New York, is a little village of.no mean pretensions, in 
Hunterdon County, on the south branch of the Raritan. 
It has fine water privileges and extensive limestone quar- 
ries, from which a vast district of country is supplied. 
Its mills are large, and its mercantile business very con- 
siderable, arising from the fact that it is surrounded by 
one of the richest agricultural districts of the country. 
Clinton proper is two miles from the station, on the 
banks of the river, and a rival village has grown up round 
the station which threatens to outstrip the original set- 
tlement. A branch railway to the village has been char- 
tered. 

At Clinton we cross the south branch of the Raritan 
over the far-famed High Bridge, which is 105 feet high 




VIEW FKOM HIGH BRIDGE. 



and 1300 feet long. But the glory of this bridge has 
now departed ; it has lost its old claim of picturesque- 
ness. The company have for three or four years been 
transforming it into a lofty embankment, with a double 
arch culvert, at a cost, when completed, of $180,000. 
What has been lost in romance has surely been gained 
in durability. 



28 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

High Bridge. From this station we follow the Spruce 
Run in among the hills to 

Clarksvitte, fifty-nine miles distant from New York ; 
and a mile farther on is 

New Hampton, where is the junction of the Dela- 
ware, Lackawanna, and Western Railroad. 

Here the traveler changes to the broad-gauge cars for 
the Delaware Water Gap, Scranton, and the Wyoming 
Valley, unless he prefers keeping directly on to Easton 
and the Lehigh Valley, reversing the route as now given, 
in which case he will remain in the cars. 



V. 

HAMPTON JUNCTION TO DELAWAEE WATEE GAP. 

At Hampton Junction we have before us the beauti- 
ful Musconetcong Valley, which, although it can not 
boast of an extensive area, is yet, in the matter of beau- 
ty and richness of soil, perhaps without a superior in the 
United States. Indeed, standing on this elevation, one 
has before him a prospect of lowlands and rolling hills, 
dotted with cosy hamlets, with thrifty fields stretching 
between, which only Durand's pencil could interpret tru- 
ly, preserving with his genial touches the soul of beauty 
which shines through all the splendid vista. 

The country which we now enter has a more varied 
and romantic aspect. We find ourselves penetrating a 
hilly district full of rich farm-lands, and the eye revels 
with delight among features of surpassing beauty. 

Six miles from Hampton Junction we reach the little 
village of 

Washington, which is drained by the Musconetcong 
and Pohatcong Rivers, and contains a population of 
about 2000 souls. It is situated at the left of the rail- 
road, and makes a very charming appearance, with its 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 29 

many elegant cottages and its numerous tokens of out- 
ward prosperity. Leaving Washington, we are borne 
through Oxford Mountain by way of the Van Ness Tun- 
nel, which is half a mile in length. 

Oxford Furnace, three miles beyond Washington, is 
an enterprising town on a branch of the Pequest River. 
There is an extensive furnace here, which gives name 
to the town, and iron ore of a rich quality is found in 
abundance in the vicinity, and is easily smelted. 

Bridgeville, five miles farther on, is on the Pequest 
River, and at 

Hope, a mile beyond, a junction may be effected with 
the Belvidere-Delaware Railway by an omnibus ride of 
three miles. The town is drained by Beaver and other 
creeks, the affluents of the Delaware. At this point we 
are seventy-five miles from New York City, in the midst 
of the fertile townships of Warren County. Passing 
through 

Delaioare Station, three miles distant, the chief attrac- 
tion of which is the fifteen minutes' opportunity afforded 
for dinner, we reach 

Columbia, which is a small village on the east bank of 
the Delaware, at the mouth of Paulius Kill, and three 
miles beyond Delaware Station, from which a ride of five 
miles conducts us to the Water Gap. 

As the reader has noticed, we have been moving along 
a series of rivers and creeks, which, besides adding so 
sensibly to the fertility of the country, have been charm- 
ing to the eye, and refreshing to every bodily sense. 
These streams are skirted too by forests, which here and 
there grow quite down to the water's edge, adding very 
much to the general beauty of the scenery. The hills 
around us on either side, and the mountains beyond, to- 
gether with the long reaches of the valleys that inter- 
vene — these are more vivid, as presented to the eye of 
the actual observer, than they can be as reproduced by 
means of descriptive sketches. 



/ 



,< 



30 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 



VI. 

DELAWARE WATER GAP. 

Through the Delaware Water Gap, as through a 
wide-open gate, we enter into an inner circle of mount- 
ain scenery, entirely different to that which we have 
seen hitherto — more romantic and more abrupt. And 
to this more intimate recess of the mountains the Gap is 
a fit entrance. It is visible for some distance before we 
enter it, but at a distance only those features are discern- 
ible which are common to all openings of this nature. 

These gaps are a natural feature of very frequent oc- 
currence in the Appalachian range. 

The Blue Mountain (or Kittatinny) has, besides this 
gap which is made by the Delaware, another similar 
break called Wind Gap, made by the Lehigh, farther to 
the west, another made by the Schuylkill, and still an- 
other by the Susquehanna, above Harrisburg. 

According to Professor Rogers, the distinguished ge- 
ologist of Pennsylvania, certain transverse dislocations 
have occurred in all the great ridges and valleys of the 
Appalachian region, being the primary cause of most, if 
not all of these deep notches, which are so commonly 
known as water gaps, and which cleave so many high 
mountain ridges to their very bases. And in all these 
phenomena he traces the following uniform law, viz., that 
the eastward strata of the fissure are thrust forward to 
the north. Thus there is a gap in Sharp Mountain, in 
which the eastern prolongation has been thrust north- 
ward of the western by a distance of many hundred 
yards. In the wide gaj> of the Susquehanna, above Har- 
risburg, the law is shown by measurement ; and in the 
Delaware Water Gap, it is apparent to the eye that the 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. S3 

New Jersey mountain side has strata thrown several 
hundred feet to the northward of the Pennsylvania side. 

We would suggest, however, that it may be more 
proper to say that the western side has been thrown to 
the southward, than that the eastern has been thrust 
northward ; for it seems to be necessary to account for 
these clefts by the influence of water acting after the vol- 
canic eruptions which formed the mountain ranges had 
already taken place ; and as the streams that now make 
their way through these run southward to the Atlantic 
in such a manner as to strike more forcibly the western 
embankment, we would naturally suppose that originally 
this had something to do with the southward projection 
of the western sides of the mountains. 

The Delaware River, which penetrates the Kittatinny 
at this point, rises, as do also the principal tributaries of 
the Susquehanna, in New York State. It rises in two 
branches on the west of the Catskill Mountains. These 
branches join each other before entering the state, about 
ninety-five miles above the gap, the latter part of which 
distance it runs along the base of the Kittatinny Mount- 
ain. The river winds in its course, and is at this point 
of considerable depth. It frequently overflows the flats 
upon its banks, which the farmers always hail as a god- 
send, so much does it add to the fertility of the land 
through the rich deposit which it leaves behind. 

The distance through the mountain is about two miles, 
and the banks rise precipitously from the water's edge to 
the height of 1600 feet, leaving at the southeast entrance 
scarcely room for a road beneath the overhanging rocks. 
The strata of the mountain lie at a considerable angle 
with the horizon, giving evidence of the might of the 
convulsions by which they were raised from their orig- 
inal level, and they are made up mostly of sandstone and 
conglomerate rock. 

If our fellow-traveler should ask of us what season 

B 2 



34 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

would be the most favorable for our visit to the miracle 
of Nature, we should answer, those seasons which are 
most favorable to the view of any sort of natural scen- 
ery. He may choose the early summer, for the sake of 
the rich verdure of the surrounding landscape; or he 
may come in autumn, when Nature puts on her garb of 
crimson and gold, and see what a charm it is which in- 
vests our American forests ; but, at whatever season, he 
shall find the entire scene — -the near mountains, and the 
gently-winding Delaware, and the cleft sides of the Kit- 
tatinny, with the two long, low ledges which it puts 
forth like arms on either side of the river, upward and 
downward, as if it would reach up to punish the violent 
river at its sources, or, on the other hand, would chase it 
down vengefully to the bay — one of the most pictur- 
esque which this green earth can afford. 

The views of the Gap, of course, are varied, as seen 
from different points. The tourist may take his posi- 
tion below the Gap, on the banks of the river, and will 
here, doubtless, get the most favorable view of the fis- 
sure itself. From the Kittatinny House a better posi- 
tion is afforded for the full continuation of the scene ; 
and by ascending to the top of the mountain on the 
Pennsylvania side — an ascent of about four miles — he 
will obtain a magnificent view of the extended valley of 
the Delaware, including also a vast reach of mountain 
scenery. 

The Kittatinny House is situated on a high ledge in 
the Gap itself, on the Pennsylvania side, and is a favor- 
ite summer resort for travelers. There is a pretty little 
village half a mile above the Gap, where one seems some- 
how to be thrown backward into a past generation, so 
old-fashioned are the habits of the country farmers who 
live here, daily tilling the soil of the rich meadow-lands 
along the river, and nightly gathering in the bar-room of 
the Brainerd Hotel for that familiar gossip so loved of 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. v 37 

old, when the good people of this world seem to have 
had time for it. 

The view which the artist has given here from Sunset 
Rock looks up the Delaware from the inside of the Gap. 



VII. 

DELAWARE WATER GAP TO SCRANTON. 

If we had continued our original course along the 
Central Railroad of New Jersey from Hampton to its 
western terminus, a distance of fifteen miles, we should 
have entered Pennsylvania at Easton, crossing the Dela- 
ware at that point ; but, instead of that, we have been 
traveling northwest, over the Delaware, Lackawanna, 
and Western Railroad, for a distance of twenty-six miles, 
and have entered Pennsylvania through the Water Gap 
about twenty-five miles above Easton. 

This same course, by the same road, we now continue 
toward Scranton, which is the northern limit of our 
route. The ride from Water Gap to Scranton combines 
features of real sublimity, such as are to be obtained by 
no other ride of the same distance in the country. This 
is due to the fact that we actually climb a mountain up- 
ward of 2000 feet high — as high as Hoosick Mountain, 
through which the Troy and Boston Railroad are thrust- 
ing their celebrated tunnel — and descend again to its 
base, having during the entire distance an unobstructed 
view of a vast reach of country to the left, the features 
of which yield the very consummation of the romantic. 
Here the traveler should take the left-hand side of the 
car, the view to the right being obstructed by the 
mountain. 

This ride seems to upset all our ideas as to the limit- 
ations restricting railroad construction. Indeed, when 
we consider tho natural difficulties in the way of the 



38 , GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western Railroad, we can 
no longer wonder that, although the earliest of the coal- 
roads in its charter, it was the very last to be completed. 
Nor were natural difficulties the only ones. The road, 
in a pre-eminent sense, was built upon confidence in the 
uncertain future. It was under the necessity of creating 
the traffic that was to fill its cars ; for it was only by the 
encouragement which it could offer through a ready 
communication with the Eastern market that the vast 
measures of coal, scattered in careless profusion through 
the Wyoming and Lackawanna valleys, and upon the 
transportation of which it counted for its own support, 
could even get an appreciable value. 

Four miles from the Delaware Water Gap is situated 

Stroudsbttrg, the shire town of Monroe County, 
Penn., on the north bank of Smithfield Creek. Its pop- 
ulation now numbers over 1000. The town is laid out 
on one street, and has a court-house, jail, and the build- 
ings incident to a shire town. There is also quite an 
extensive forging business carried on. 

Spragueville, five miles farther on, is a small village 
on Broadhead Creek. Commencing at Spragueville, we 
have an upward grade of sixty-five feet to the mile, di- 
rectly up the Pocono, for a distance of twenty-five miles. 

There is little particularly noticeable about the sta- 
tions between Spragueville and Scranton, the most of 
which are hardly to be called villages even, consisting 
for the most part of the humble dwellings of the wood- 
cutter, the teamster, the saw-mill proprietor, railroad 
workman, etc. 

Henryville and Moscow, however, have greater pre- 
tensions than any of the others. The streams upon the 
Pocono Mountain, in the vicinity of Tobyhanna, thirty- 
six miles beyond the Water Gap, are celebrated for the 
abundance of trout found in them, which give them a pe- 
culiar charm for the amateur fisherman. 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 39 

The peculiar scenery which this portion of the route 
affords is its most notable characteristic. 

After ascending the mountain for three miles (from 
Spragueville to Henry ville), we begin to look down from 
a continually increasing height upon the valley below. 

A little beyond Oakland, which is five miles beyond 
Henryville, the view grows bolder in feature and even 
magnificent. It is no rare occurrence here to see the 
heavy mist-clouds far below us in the valley, while we 
seem to be traveling upon a plane raised high above the 
earth. 

Between Oakland and Pocono Forks, which is six 
miles from the former place, the features which we have 
noticed are heightened to their crowning point of grand- 
eur. Over against us, in distinct relief against the sky, 
is seen the Delaware Water Gap, which we have left 
twenty-three miles behind us, but which now appears di- 
rectly at our left ; below it, reposing in its shadow, oth- 
er low ridges lie successively, while between these and 
ourselves a wide-reaching valley intervenes. We are 
here 1100 feet above the level of the Water Gap. 

Tobyhanna, thirty miles beyond the Gap, is on the 
top of the mountain. 

We soon begin to descend again, through rugged for- 
est scenery, for more than twenty miles, passing through 
Gouldsboro', Dunning, and Greenville, to 

Scranton. This now important place is fifty-seven 
miles from the Water Gap and 143 from New York. 

Just before reaching the town, the traveler should not 
fail to notice the romantic cascade which is formed by 
Roaring Brook, as it leaps over the mountain rocks on 
the way to Scranton. 

This same Roaring Brook is very intimately associ- 
ated with the business growth of Scranton. It was upon 
its banks that Philip Abbot, in 1788, built the first grist- 
mill in the neighborhood, which, besides answering for 



40 



GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 




iOAKING BROOK FALLS. 



the necessities of Lu- 
zerne County, had 
also to supply the de- 
mands of two adjoin- 
ing counties. It was 
surely sufficiently sim- 
ple in its construc- 
tion, both as regards 
the building and the 
internal mechanism. 
The edifice was sup- 
ported by crotches 
rudely thrust into the 
ground ; the spindle 
L. of the mill-stones was turned by a 
leathern belt that passed around the 
drum of the water-wheel, and for a bolt a 
I jjjjf dry deerskin was used, completely perfora- 
Hp ted with small holes, and this unique con- 

p'i" trivance was all that separated the flour from 

i. ii'i' 1 . _ 

■' the coarse bran. 

In 1798, Benjamin and Ebenezer Slocum (brothers of 
the little Frances, the story of whose abduction from 
Wyoming, when she was only five years of age, by the 
Indians, has become a matter of familiar tradition) set- 
tled here, bought the grist-mill, built a saw-mill and a 
forge, carried on the distilleries, and purchased besides 
1700 acres of land, long known as the " Slocum Farm." 

The town had at first gone by the name of Capouse, 
the name of the chief of a tribe of the Delawares dwell- 
ing upon the flats at the original settlement of the place ; 
but from the prominence of the Slocum brothers it came 
now to be called " Slocum Hollow," certainly not a more 
euphonious title than that which it displaced. 

Yet in 1810 there were but three dwelling-houses in 
the town, though a post-office was established, the mail 



mm 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 43 

being brought from Easton over the mountains, vid 
Wilkesbarre, once a week, on horseback. 

The village of Scranton owes its establishment to the 
efforts made by the friends of the Drinker Railroad to 
get the road constructed. William Henry was the first 
man who fully appreciated the importance of the natural 
resources of the place, the value of a speedy communica- 
tion with market by railroad, and the result which such 
a road would have upon the prosperity of the infant vil- 
lage. In partnership with Edward Armstrong, from the 
Hudson, he bought 503 acres of land. Upon the death 
of Armstrong soon after, Selden Scranton and his broth- 
er, Colonel George W. Scranton, together with a Mr. 
Grant, entered into copartnership with Henry, and pur- 
chased the entire Slocum estate. 

From the 11th of September, 1840, when the building 
of this company's blast furnace was commenced, is to be 
dated the commencement of what we to-day call Scran- 
ton. The products of the furnace were shipped tomar- 
ket by the Delaware and Hudson Canal, or by the North 
Branch and Tide-water Canal, and in either case had to 
be conveyed for miles on wagons in order to connect 
with these communications. The first rolling-mill and 
nail-factory was completed in 1844, and here, in 1845, 
the T rail was made for the first time in the United 
States. Two years after this the Erie Railroad contract- 
ed with the Scrantons for 1200 tons of iron rails. The 
honor of the inception of the railroad from Great Bend 
(forty-seven miles northwest of Scranton) to the "Water 
Gap is due to Colonel G. W. Scranton. In 1853 the 
present line was adopted. Fifteen years before the com- 
pletion of a railroad outlet, lands rich in coal were pur- 
chased for $15 per acre, which now sell for $300. 

The greater part of Scranton has been built up in the 
course of the last ten years, and so rapid has been its 
growth that it has now a population of about 12,000. 



44 



GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 



The town is situated on the banks of the Lackawanna 
River. The best view to be had of it is obtained by vis- 
iting the eminence of Hyde Park, which is on the oppo- 
site side of the river. One looking from this point will 
behold upon the left hand the more elegant portion of 
the town, while a very large section which he beholds 
at the right, and which vulgarly goes by the name of 
Shanty vitte, is made up of the humble dwellings of the 
coal -miners and the laborers in other works. These 
buildings, looking each one the copy of its neighbor, and 
withal so uniformly laid out in rows, with narrow lanes 
between, present a truly picturesque appearance. The 
natural scenery, as viewed from this point,, is not with- 
out its characteristic excellence. The river, which winds 
about the town, is plentifully margined with shade- 
trees, and the view by the railroad bridge is very pret- 




RAILKOAD BRIDGE AT BCKA3STON. 



ty. The mountains which surround the town have gen- 
erally none of that hazy veil about them which distance 
would give, so near are they, and their forms so well de- 
fined. 

Just noticing that Hyde Park is itself a village of no 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 47 

mean pretensions, let us return to the opposite side. 
Near the station is to be «een what, from its shape, is 
called the Round House, and which contains the engine 
that blows the blast furnace, one of the largest, if not 
quite the largest engine in the country. 
' Taking the main street of the town to the northward, 
we soon reach the Wyoming House, an elegant edifice 
of large proportions, and affording the traveler the most 
excellent accommodations. 

A walk of five minutes from the station takes us to 
the Rolling Mills, on the banks of Roaring Brook. On 
the way we pass the residence of the late Colonel Scran- 
ton, which is very elegant both in itself and in its sur- 
roundings. These mills are on the north side of the 
town, and, to be properly appreciated for their scenic 
effect,, should be visited at night. They consume over 
100,000 tons of coal yearly, and employ over 1000 men. 

The appearance of these mills at night, when each tall 
chimney is surmounted by a crown of flame, and every 
window glares like a great eye of fire, with streaks of 
dazzling light pouring like tongues of flame from every 
door, set off in the most striking relief by the darkness 
around, baffles description. 

The ore is first taken from the mine about eight miles 
from the mills ; then it is smelted and run into pig-iron 
in the furnaces, after which it is ready for what are called 
the " puddling mills." 

The process of " puddling" gives one an idea of man- 
ual labor about as effectually as any known operation in- 
cident to mechanic art. A dozen or so bars of pig-iron 
are placed in a furnace by themselves, and, after being 
heated to a high degree, are taken out to be " puddled" 
— that is, to be wrought by a sort of kneading process. 
For this purpose they are put into a separate furnace, 
which is covered in front by a door, in which is a circu- 
lar aperture that admits the long bars of the workmen. 



48 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

The process which the iron undergoes under the heat to 
which it is exposed, in connection with the perpetual 
stirring together or kneading which the workman gives 
it, is one of decarbonization. After the pig-iron has 
reached the proper heat, say in about one hour, it begins 
to crumble and dissolve, and soon it begins to seethe in 
a sea of melted cinders. Then it begius to yield sensi- 
bly to the puddling, under which process it is, in the 
course of another hour, massed and concentrated into 
four or five separate balls, averaging nearly a hundred 
pounds each. During these two hours the workmen, 
who attain perfection in their trade only through years 
of practice, stand stripped to the waist within reach of 
a heat absolutely intolerable to one unaccustomed to it, 
busily plying their long bars upon the pile within the 
furnace, and facing unflinchingly the glaring mass as it 
rolls from the furnace-jaws, seeming like so many "Plu- 
tonian shapes" fondling infernal fires. It is heavy work 
too-; and it develops chests in these men such as are to 
be met with nowhere else. Look in upon the balls 
after their two hours' ordeal, and imagine, if you can, 
that these incandescent crystals, as they seem, will in 
one hour be simply black iron again ! 

The balls, completed, are taken from the furnace in 
barrows made for the purpose, and wheeled a little dis- 
tance to a machine, called the crocodile from its shape, 
which chews them into a cylindrical shape convenient 
for the process of rolling which is to follow, and crushes 
or squeezes out the clinker with which the iron is still 
filled. The entrance of the balls into the machine is ac- 
companied with an explosive report, arising from the 
sudden contact of the red-hot iron with cold water. 
The iron is then rolled, which is simply a process of elon- 
gation, accomplished by passing it through several sets 
of rollers, till it is of the length and shape required. But 
this is only the preliminary rolling. The reader has seen 



CENTRAL RAILROAD *0F NEW JERSEY. 49 

that railroad iron, when worn, shows several distinct lay- 
ers or laminm welded together. This appearance is due 
to the fact that the rails, after their first rolling, are again 
broken up into short ones of about three feet long, and 
then, placed in piles of about eight inches breadth and 
depth, are put into heating furnaces, and, after being- 
brought to a white heat, are taken out, and each pile is 
rolled into a rail, which, after being sawed off the proper 
length while still hot from the rolls, is afterward care- 
fully straightened by one machine, then notched for the 
spikes by another machine, and is ready for use. 



VIII. 



THE COAL-FIELDS. 



The most important feature of Scranton is that it is 
the centre of the Lackawanna coal region. 

Geographically, the coal-fields of Pennsylvania are in- 
cluded between the Blue Ridge and the Susquehanna. 
The reader will understand that we refer solely to an- 
thracite coal. These fields are naturally divided into 
three compartments, viz., the Lackawanna Coal Basin, 
including the coal measures of Lackawanna and Wyo- 
ming valleys ; the Lehigh Basin, farther south, and cen- 
tering about Mauch Chunk ; and the Schuylkill Basin, 
still farther to the southward. 

The geological relations of this important product 
form an interesting study. Let the reader imagine a 
line drawn from Nova Scotia to the Far West ; this line 
will represent the backbone about which this continent 
has been built up. Time was when all that existed of 
America was a range of hills along this line, which, with 
their bases elevated above the level of the ocean, formed 
a long but narrow island, on the north and south of 
which rolled two grand oceans. 

C 



50 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

The Alleghanies were not yet, nor the Rocky Mount- 
ains. 

By the gradual abrasion of the earth's surface under 
the influence of the waters, stratified deposits were 
formed, which at length appeared above the water-level 
in low marshy islands. Every condition was favorable 
to the most luxuriant vegetation ; growth was swiftly 
followed by decay, and decay by growth, until beneath 
the surface lay an inexhaustible treasure of bituminous 
matter. Now, after this work had been going on for 
centuries, let the reader imagine the violent dislocations 
and disturbances which would result to this quiescent 
mass of vegetation by the upheaval of the Appalachian 
range in successive ridges. He will also readily under- 
stand that each ridge thrown up to the southward must 
necessarily have inclosed and imprisoned many an inly- 
ing body of water. These pent-up waters, violently forc- 
ing an outlet through the mountains — outlets which still 
remain, and which, in the proper place, we have noticed 
in speaking of water gaps— of course tore up, and, so far 
as was possible, swept away the already loosened strata 
of the coal formations. Where the mountain ranges had 
been thrown to a loftier height, as in those farther to 
the southward, a greater resistance was offered to the 
escape of the inclosed seas, and therefore the escape, 
when effected, was more violent in its effects, which ac- 
counts for the fact that, for the most part, the coal meas- 
ures of the south have been entirely swept away. North 
of the Susquehanna, however, there was not sufficient 
violence to destroy the coal, but yet enough to insure its 
exposure to those external influences by which it has 
been freed from its hydrogen, and thus changed from 
bituminous to anthracite coal. In the western part of 
the state there was hardly any disturbance at all, there- 
fore no exposure, therefore no anthracite. 

The " outcrop" of the coal is generally found in the 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 51 

vicinity of rivers ; but sometimes we find it in situations 
into which it has been carried by water. Scranton 
stands upon a deposit formed in this manner. Above 
the coal lie clay, micaceous sandstone, and slate; and 
underneath it lie shale, conglomerate sandstone, and the 
old Devonian deposits — strata which, at their greater 
depth, extend, according to the estimate of Professor 
Rogers, 40,000 feet below the surface. 

The Lackawanna and Wyoming Valleys lie, as related 
to each other, in the position of two outspread wings, 
balancing about Pittston as their pivotal centre, where 
the Lackawanna River empties into the Susquehanna. 
From Carbondale, at the head of the Lackawanna Val- 
ley, the coal basin extends to Shickshinny, where the 
Wyoming Valley terminates — a distance of about fifty 
miles. Over this space there are scattered some fifty 
collieries, belonging generally to the railroad or canal 
companies, but in some cases to private individuals. 

The mines are exceedingly simple in their mechanism 
and operations. Where the " outcrop" allows of a direct 
access to the mine by means of an inclined plane, this 
plane is called a slope; if such access is inconvenient, a 
shaft is sunk perpendicularly downward, sometimes for 
a distance of 200 feet before reaching the coal. Over 
the shafts or over the summit of the slope, a tall, slender 
structure is built, called a coal-cracker. These are all 
very similar, so that seeing one is seeing all; therefore 
we will consider particularly the Oxford Shaft, which, 
besides being now nearly at hand, has also the advantage 
of the latest improvements. This mine is on the Hyde- 
Park side of the river, and is owned by the Oxford Coal 
Company. 

As to the interior of the mine itself, there is nothing 
particularly interesting, though, from mere curiosity, per- 
sons are tempted to descend the shaft. This subterra- 
nean visit reveals nothing else than a series of cham- 



52 



GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 



bers extending in every direction, which are called drifts. 
The process of mining is very simple, yetf experience and 
skill are necessary in the miner, in order to avoid the 
possibility of accident. As your guide leads you to the 
end of one of these chambers, roofed with slate or coal, 
you have an opportunity of witnessing the miner at his 
work of blasting. Making a hole horizontally, directly 
before him, in the coal rock with his crowbar, he charges 
it with powder, applies the slow-match, gives the- con- 
certed signal, retreats. The exjDlosion takes place, and 
the coal is then put into the car, which has been at the 
proper time brought near upon rails laid for that pur- 
pose in each separate chamber. These cars hold two or 
three tons each, and when filled are carried back to the 
entrance of the shaft. The mules employed in this trans- 
portation have their stables in the mines ; their drivers 
are generally Irish, while, for the most part, the miners 
themselves are Welsh. The full cars are drawn up the 
shaft by steam. 

If we enter the room of the coal-cracker, which lies on 




COAL-CKACKEE — EXTEKIOE. 



the ground floor (on a level, that is, with the road), we 
shall see the engine at its work elevating these cars, or 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 



53 



letting empty ones back into the mine. The engine also 
turns the coal-breaker. The coal in the full cars is car- 
ried to the very top of the building, where a workman 
stands ready to take out of each the card of the miner 
to whose account the load is to be attributed ; after 
which the car " dumps off" its contents into a shute, 
along which it is conducted to a " landing," where are 
stationed other workmen with picks, to break up any 
pieces too large to go on to the breaker. Through an- 
other shute the coal is conveyed into a sort of hopper, 
from which it passes between the rollers of the breaker, 
the toothed surfaces of which crush the coal into various 
sizes, just as it happens; after which it is emptied into 
cylindrical screens which are continually revolving, and, 
as they move, let the various sizes slip through apertures 
of corresponding sizes, the largest size of all, the steam- 
boat coal, passing out at the open end of the screen. 
There is a set of apertures for grate, one for egg, one 
for stove, one for chestnut, and another for pea coal. 
Each size is dropped from the screen into a separate 
shute, and all along- these shutes little boys of from five 
to ten years old are stationed to pick out from the coal, 
as it passes, the slate-stone which inevitably gets mixed 




COAL-CUACKER — INTERIOR. 



54 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

up with it. This room, containing the screens and these 
shutes, is called the slate-picker's room, which is given in 
the sketch as the interior view of the coal-cracker. The 
coal, after leaving the slate-pickers, passes on down the 
shutes into the pockets or large bins at the end of each, 
placed to receive it, and from these it is shipped to mar- 
ket via the Lackawanna and Bloomsburg, or the Dela- 
ware, Lackawanna, and Western Railroad. The connec- 
tion with these roads is made by a system of lateral 
roads which lead in all directions to the various mines. 

For each load a miner receives about seventy -two 
cents, and he frequently makes from sixty to eighty dol- 
lars per month. But he is not provident ; his monthly 
wages are spent almost as soon as earned, and generally 
in " sprees" with his companions. It is considered mean 
to lay up any thing. Hence it is, probably, that the min- 
er puts his children into the mines to the work of slate- 
picking at the earliest possible moment. He has no idea 
of any better lot for his children than has befallen him- 
self. 

Accidents sometimes happen in the mines, but not fre- 
quently. Curiously, at the moment we are writing this, 
upon glancing at an evening paper, we find a report of 
a recent serious explosion from fire-damp at Howell & 
Co.'s mines in Hyde Park. Eight boys were killed, and 
three others seriously wounded. Sometimes, too, the 
wall breaks in, actually burying the miners alive, so that 
suffocation ensues before there is a chance for rescue. 
These accidents frequently develop the noblest qualities 
in the nature of the miners and their overseers. In the 
winter of 1843 and 1844, a portion of the Delaware and 
Hudson's Co.'s mines at Carbondale fell in upon the 
workmen. For several days there had been a premoni- 
tory crackling. At the time of the catastrophe all the 
lamps were put out, and workmen or horses entering or 
leaving the mouth of the cavern were blown from it as 



CENTRAL EAILE0AD OF NEW JEESEY. 55 

leaves before the wind. Those at work farther on were 
buried alive, and crushed by the strong teeth of the coal- 
slate. Alexander Bryden, assistant superintendent of 
the mines, hastened in to discover the situation, and, al- 
though met by three miners who warned him of his dan- 
ger, he patiently found an opening into the mine, but so 
small that he had to lie prostrate and drag himself along. 
Traveling a mile thus, he reached the " heading," or end 
of the chamber, found twenty men alive, but shut in by 
a solid wall of coal, and among them his own son ! He 
went still farther in to find and rescue a wounded miner, 
lifting whom upon his shoulder he retraced his steps. 

In closing what we have to say about the coal-fields 
of this region, it is impossible not to remark the import- 
ant fact that, while all along the Lackawanna, from its 
source to Pittston, where it joins the Susquehanna, the 
coal measures seem to lie in careless profusion, yet, if we 
trace the Susquehanna itself up to the two lakes in New 
York which constitute its sources, not one vein of coal is 
to be found. This goes to prove that the grand basin 
between the Blue Ridge on one side, and the lower por- 
tion of the Susquehanna and the whole of the Lackawan- 
na River on the other, was once a vast lake, into which 
emptied the waters of the Chemung, the Chenango, the 
Delaware, and the Susquehanna {i. e., the upper portion 
of it), which waters forced for themselves outlets south- 
ward to the Atlantic through the Water Gap and simi- 
lar clefts in the ridge which formed their outward inclo- 
sure. Instead of the lake, there were left, after this ex- 
pulsion, only the prolongations of the several rivers com- 
ing from the north, and along these prolonged parts of 
the rivers where such violent forces have been at work 
the coal has become exposed, and, in many cases, has 
been conveyed from inaccessible places to just the posi- 
tion convenient for the purposes of the miner. 



56 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 



IX. 

SCEANTON TO SUNBUEY — THE WYOMING VALLEY. 

Oue course now lies in a southwesterly direction from 
Scranton, over the Lackawanna and Bloomsburg Rail- 
road. This road was incorporated in 1852. It extends 
from Scranton to Northumberland, a distance of eighty 
miles. The wealth of the country through which it pass- 
es consists chiefly of coal, the agricultural resources of 
the Lackawanna and Wyoming Valleys being neither 
very abundant nor very well developed. 

Taylorville^ the first station upon the road, is a village 
three miles from Scranton, and near it is the Union Col- 
liery, the first one which is to be found on the Lackawan- 
na River below the Oxford and Bellevue mines at Hyde 
Park, Three miles beyond is 

Lackawanna. Here iron ore is found. The North 
Branch divisions of the Pennsylvania Canal crosses the 
town seventy-three miles from Northumberland. The 
population of the town is upward of 1000. 

Pittston, nine miles from Scranton, is a thriving town. 
Between Taylorville and Pittston are three collieries, be- 
longing to various companies. Here the Lackawanna 
empties into the Susquehanna, and here, too, is the head 
of the Wyoming Valley. From this point to Northum- 
berland we follow the North Branch of the Susquehanna 
for seventy miles. 

The Wyoming Valley, which we now enter, is inti- 
mately connected, as regards its early history, with the 
Lackawanna, which we have just left behind. Both val- 
leys were in the first place settled by New Englanders 
from the State of Connecticut ; but their possession of 
the soil was disputed by the Pennsylvania landholders, 
and from this resulted what was called the " Yankee and 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 57 

Pennamite war." It was not the object of the Yankees 
to set up a separate state jurisdiction ; they were will- 
ing to give allegiance to the Pennsylvanians. But with 
this the great landholders were not satisfied ; they did 
not want these shrewd men and lovers of liberty among 
them, it being their settled purpose that the whole social 
and political power of the state should rest with them- 
selves ; they wished to repeat the feudal system, in which 
the working people are merely tenants dependent upon 
the plantation-holders. 

But Yankees and Feudalists never agreed, hence the 
war, which, although never productive of a great deal 
of bloodshed, was yet full of animosity, and brought 
great embarrassments upon the early settlers of these 
two valleys. 

The war of the Revolution put an end, of course, to 
all sectional animosities of this sort; but that war brought 
itself a burden more intolerable. The English thought 
proper to make use of savages in this contest, and the 
inhabitants of Wyoming and Lackawanna Valleys, from 
their vicinity to the neighborhood of the Six Nations, 
and the necessary depletion of their strength to meet the 
demands of Washington's army, were especially vulner- 
able to attack. This the " British Butler" only knew too 
well, when, on the last day of June, 1778, he entered the 
Valley of the Wyoming with four hundred Provincials 
and six or seven hundred Indians. It was against this 
army that 300 men had to contend on the fatal 3d of 
July. The British army at the first took Fort Winter- 
moot, at the head of the Valley, without opposition. At 
this crisis the brave little band advanced from Forty 
Fort to oppose the invaders of their homes ; they, too, 
were led by a Butler. Reaching Fort Wintermoot, they 
marked off the ground for the battle and took position, 
their right resting upon a steep bank, and their left ex- 
tending: across the flat to a morass thick with "brush- 

C 2 



58 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

wood at the base of the mountains. Colonel Butler 
commanded the right wing and Colonel Denison the 
left. Said Colonel Butler, " Stand firm the first shock, 
and the Indians will give way. Every man to his duty." 
This word Denison repeated on the left. The battle be- 
gan about four o'clock in the afternoon. As the Yan- 
kees fired, and at each fire steadily advanced, the British 
line was forced to give way. This was in the open 
ground. The Indian flanking party, however, on the 
right, caused great annoyance, but it was on the left that 
the band of savages were principally massed under cov- 
er of the wood. There were six of these bands, and the 
horrid yell of battle was taken up by them each in suc- 
cession. Soon the Indians had outflanked the left, which 
was thrown into confusion. A change of front was at- 
tempted by Denison, but the order was by some misun- 
derstood as one to retreat, and the confusion was made 
complete. Butler threw himself between his forces and 
the enemy, and, riding along the line, cried, " Don't leave 
me, my children, and the victory is ours." But it was 
too late. One hundred and sixty of the Connecticut peo- 
ple were killed, and the other one hundred and forty es- 
caped. Many were made prisoners and brutally massa- 
cred. Forty Fort was surrendered, and those to whom 
it had been a place of security were compelled to take 
their memorable exodus through the " Shades of Death," 
and eastward over the mountains. 

As we move down the Valley, we continually, by many 
local associations, are painfully reminded of the sad de- 
tails of this tragedy. 

The most prominent natural object of interest in the 
vicinity of Pittston is Campbell's Ledge. The base of 
the mountain, of which the ledge is the crowning bluff, 
is washed on the one side by the Susquehanna, and on 
the other by the Lackawanna River. 

In order to reach this ledge we must cross the canal 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 



59 



bridge, and our course is then open to the mountain, 
which it requires some athletic exertion to climb. One 
reaches at length the more open woods, and stands upon 
the brink of the abrupt precipice. The name is said to be 
derived from a tradition that a Mr. Campbell once leaped 
off this crag to escape from pursuing Indians. Others 
think that the name was given in honor of the poet who 
has made the Valley illustrious through his " Gertrude 
of Wyoming," though it must be confessed that Camp- 
bell knew nothing of the Wyoming of which he wrote. 

The view from Campbell's Ledge has this advantage : 
the two mountain ranges which inclose the valley are 
both seen at once in their prominence ; the whole valley, 
also, is given in greater completeness than from any oth- 
er point. 

From Pittston we keep the right bank of the river. 
The Wyoming or North Branch Canal connects Pittston 
with tide-water. As we advance beyond the town we 
can see where Fort Wintermoot stood, and a short dis- 
tance below it, between the site of the fort and the mon- 
ument, is Queen Esther's Rock, a conglomerate boulder 




queen estiiee's book. 



60 



GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 



about a foot and a half high, situated on the brow of a 
high, steep bank. The rock in one portion is of a red- 
dish color, which the credulous take for the old blood- 
stain. The Indian queen after whom the rock is named, 
having lost her son in battle, proceeded, according to 
custom, after the defeat of the Yankees, to sacrifice to 
his manes about sixteen prisoners, whom with her own 
hands she beat to death, dashing their brains out with 
her death-mall, two only of the unfortunate victims es- 
caping to reveal the fate of the rest. 

The monument, which has been erected near the old 

battle-field, is seen near the 
station called Wyoming. 
It is within the township 
of Kingston, on the right 
bank of the river, and rises 
above the common grave 
in which the victims of the 
memorable battle were 
buried. But how are the 
brave dead forgotten ! The 
settlers returned to the 
Valley — returned to their 
old modes of life, but free 
from the old perils; they 
planted in peace along the 
river that had seen their 
brothers and fathers bleed, 
and in peace they gathered in their harvests, but, strange 
as it may seem, although at an early period after the 
battle (in October of the same year) the bones of the 
patriots had been gathered together into one place of 
sepulture, still the time came, and within the limits of 
two generations, when the burial-place could not be 
found without great pains of search! In 1832, over 
half a century after the tragedy had transpired, the first 




WYOMING MONUMENT. 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 61 

steps were taken toward the erection of a suitable mon- 
ument. On the fifty-fourth anniversary of the battle, a 
meeting of citizens was held, eloquent addresses were 
made, and stirring resolutions passed. The grave had 
been uncovered, and whatever of eloquence there may 
have been in fractured limbs, and tomahawked and 
scalped skulls, was brought to bear upon the people to 
bring them to the " sticking-point" — i. e., to a generous 
subscription. But so unavailing were all such appeals 
that for seven years not a stone was touched; the sub^ 
scription was inadequate. In 1839 it was found necesv 
sary to appeal to the distant Legislature of Connecticut 
for $3000 to aid in the enterprise ; but this effort was 
unsuccessful. Then the ladies took the matter in their 
own hands, solicited donations and held fairs, and finally 
succeeded. The monument is sixty-two and a half feet 
high, and is constructed of granite. Upon three marble 
slabs are inscriptions, the one in front memorializing the 
events of the battle, and the other two the names of the 
fallen, under the Horatian verse, 

"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori." 

It is fit that this monument should become the central 
object of interest in the Valley; it should be surrounded 
wHh a very wilderness of flowers, and the surrounding 
grounds should be made as beautiful as possible. 

Below the monument, and on the same side of the 
river, is the site of Forty Fort, where the little village 
of Troy now stands. The fort was built in 1769 by forty 
hardy New Englanders, after whom it was named, and 
was designed to serve the double purpose of security 
against the Indians and a refuge from the Pennamites. 
It was from this fort that the brave three hundred 
marched forth to the disastrous battle of July 3, 1778. 

A ride of eight miles from Pittston conducts to the 
village of 



62 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

Kingston, which is seventeen miles from Scranton. 
The village is situated on the north bank of the river, 
and was formerly called Wyoming. It is the shipping 
place for the coal mined in the neighborhood. In 1857 
its population was 2306 ; but at present, considering the 
general ratio of increase in the entire population of the 
Valley, it must be at least 4000. From Kingston the 
omnibus takes us to 

Wilkesbakre, about a mile distant, and upon the op- 
posite side of the river. Wilkesbarre is the shire town 
of Luzerne County, and lies on the southeast bank of the 
Susquehanna. It is laid out with a beautiful regularity, 
and in many respects, especially in its quiet retirement 
and its historic associations, reminds one of New England 
villages, such, for instance, as may be found in the vicin- 
ity of Deerfield, Massachusetts. But in the mountain 
scenery with which it is invested it transcends any thing 
in Massachusetts. The borough occupies an elevated 
situation, sloping down gently to the river. The county 
buildings have a prominent location on a public square 
in the centre of the town. A court-house of more than 
ordinary pretensions has lately been built ; and, in order 
to complete what has been so well begun toward mak- 
ing this portion of the town attractive, it is only neces- 
sary that the grounds should be tastefully laid out in 
gardens and promenades. Our villages are too serious 
and glum even in their ornamentation ; they ought to 
show some lighter phases, some likings for flowers and 
music. 

This place was first settled under the Susquehanna 
Land Company of Connecticut, and was laid out in 1773. 
So great are the natural attractions of the town and its 
commercial interests, that the increase in population is 
remarkably rapid. In 1840 it was 1718 ; in 1850 it had 
increased to 2723 ; and at the present time it is said to 
have a population of 6000. This sum includes also the 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 65 

inhabitants of South Wilkesbarre, which is situated far- 
ther to the south, along the mountain. 

Wilkesbarre is in the midst of a productive region of 
anthracite coal. Above the town there are three col- 
lieries, viz., one belonging to the Baltimore Coal Com- 
pany, one the Black Diamond Colliery, and another call- 
ed the Hollenback. The Baltimore Colliery has this ad- 
vantage to the visitor, that he has to descend no shaft, 
but only to enter a tunnel, through which the mine is 
easily accessible. Below the town there is the Empire 
Colliery, and a little lower down, one or two miles south 
of Wilkesbarre, are Stanton and Co.'s, Blackman's, and 
the Hartford Collieries. Below these, and nearer the 
river, are the Consolidated Mines. 

The Wyoming, or North Branch Canal, which, as we 
have said before, extends from Pittston down to tide- 
water, passes through the borough, and is the important 
avenue of coal transportation for the mines above-men- 
tioned. 

The town contains an anthracite blast furnace, with an 
annual capacity of 1500 tons, and one of the largest roll- 
ing mills in the country, producing annually (in 1857) 
3500 tons, besides other manufacturing establishments. 

There is also in the rooms of the Historical Society a 
museum, containing a great variety of curiosities, histor- 
ical memorials, Indian relics, and collections of coins. 
For the latter was p.aid a sum of four or five thousand 
dollars. 

Of course the first visit which the tourist will make 
will be to Prospect Rock. This rock is up the mount- 
ain, directly back of Wilkesbarre. It is about midway 
down the Valley, and where the latter has its widest 
reach. It is accessible by means of a carriage to within 
two hundred yards. 

The view from Prospect Rock includes the whole Val- 
ley, from Campbell's Ledge to ISTanticoke Dam, and it 



66 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

is said that, on a clear day, even Hyde Park, opposite 
Scranton, may be clearly seen. The upper portion of 
the Valley appears an extended plain, while the lower 
section is undulating and hilly. The entire view is one 
of more than ordinary beauty, and, once impressed upon 
the eye, will not soon be forgotten. The quiet valley, 
cradled in among the mountains; the winding river, dot- 
ted with numerous islands, and forming a beautiful link 
of union between the happy villages that repose upon its 
banks ; the monument, distinctly visible just above Kings- 
ton, to the left ; and back of all these, the three separate 
and distinct ranges of the Alleghanies, rising each above 
the other, one of them near and well defined in outline, 
another more distant, and above them both a third, 
which, from its blue tops, seems to look down upon the 
Wyoming as from some other world. 

There is a hotel in the immediate vicinity, affording 
the best of accommodations to those desiring to make a 
summer stay among the mountains. The proprietor, 
Mr. Williams, is anxious to furnish an unexceptionable 
entertainment to visitors, and, besides the principal ho- 
tel, has another building higher up the mountain for the 
accommodation of travelers. 

In the village itself no one will be likely to find a more 
commodious hotel than the Phoenix, kept by Mr. Gil- 
christ. The view of the river from this hotel, particular- 
ly at sunset, is among the most beautiful that the Sus- 
quehanna affords. Turner alone could reproduce the ef- 
fect of the scene — by which we mean, that the scene is 
just such a one as Turner, of all artists, would choose to 
render upon the canvas. Who so well could delineate 
those delicate hues of sunset that warmly tint the sky 
above the mountains, and that, mingled with the shad- 
owy reflections of trees and overhanging grasses, are re- 
peated from the river ? 

The visitor to this portion of the Wyoming Valley 



CENTEAL EAILEOAD OF NEW JEESEY. 



67 




THE SUSQUEHANNA AT WILKESBABEE. 

will not find it amiss to take a day's excursion to Har- 
vey's Lake, about twelve miles west of Wilkesbarre, 
among the mountains which are seen on the west side 
of the town. A hotel called the Lake House has been 
built in the vicinity, from which the prospect, including 
an excellent view of the lake, is very beautiful. About 
the lake are woodlands which afford covert for deer and 
other wild game. In fact, Mr. Harvey, after whom it 
is named, first suspected its presence from the flight in 
this direction of wild ducks. The lake itself contains 
the finest fish. In the centre it is thought to be over 
ninety feet deep, and it is about thirty-four miles in cir- 
cuit. 

Since we are taking the longer route, via Harrisburg, 
we proceed from Wilkesbarre, on the Lackawanna and 
Bloomsburg Road, directly down the valley to North- 
umberland, having the Susquehanna at our left all the 
way, for which latter reason the traveler will find the 
left side of the car preferable to the other during this 
portion of the journey. Three miles below Kingston we 
come to 

Plymouth, which was doubtless so called after the 
New England village of the same name. It is on the 
west bank of the river, and is drained by Harvey's and 



68 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

Tobey's Creeks. It is well timbered, and abounds in 
coal. Five miles below is 

JSTa?iticoke, on the south side of the river. Sixteen 
miles below Pittston, Nanticoke Dam feeds the North 
Branch Canal, and the surplus water affords an excellent 
water-power. 

Hunloctis Creek, two miles farther on, is a station of 
no particular importance; but five miles below Nanti- 
coke we reach 

JShickshinny ', which is the southeastern limit of the 
Lackawanna Coal Basin. There is a large furnace near 
the village of about 2000 tons annual capacity. Here 
we leave the Wyoming Valley. From this point till we 
arrive at the junction of the North and West Branches 
of the Susquehanna, at Sunbury, a distance of nearly fifty 
miles, we move along a valley, or series of valleys, to 
which no especial name has been given. During this 
whole distance there is not much worthy of special no- 
tice in any of the stations, with the exception of Dan- 
ville. 

Hicks' s Ferry is a station four miles from Shickshinny. 

JBeach Haven is four miles farther on, and two miles 
below it is the thriving town of 

Berwick, in Columbia County. 

Willow Grove lies five miles farther down the river. 

Lime Ridge, two miles farther on, is so called from a 
mountain in its vicinity. 

Bloomsburg, the shire town of Columbia County, is 
fifty -six miles from Scranton, and twenty -four from 
Northumberland. It is a thriving town, publishing two 
newspapers. 

Rupert, two miles below Bloomsburg, is a lovely vil- 
lage, situated in the midst of the most striking natural 
scenery. A little below is the junction with the Cata- 
wissa Railroad, east and west. The Lackawanna and 
Bloomsburg Road keeps close to the river to Northum- 



CENTRAL RAILRQAD OF NEW JERSEY. 69 

berland, where it connects with the Northern Central, 
which still follows the river to Harrisburg, and there 
connects with the Lebanon Valley Railroad, which 
strikes across the country eastward to Reading ; and 
from thence the East Pennsylvania Railroad leads back 
toward New York, while the Philadelphia and Reading 
Railroad conducts to Philadelphia. The Catawissa Rail- 
road route, on the other hand, coinruencing at Elmira in 
New York (just above the Pennsylvania border), runs 
directly southward seventy-eight miles to Williamsport, 
where it crosses the West Branch of the Susquehanna, 
along which stream it runs, recrossing it again below 
Muncy Station, to Milton, twenty -seven miles below, 
where it leaves the West Branch, and takes a nearly 
eastward course past Danville to Rupert (where the 
tourist now is), on the East Branch of the river, which 
it crosses, moving over the country for fifty miles to 
Tamaqua. From Tamaqua through Port Clinton, and 
thence by the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad, is the 
direct route to Philadelphia, which is 197 miles from 
Williamsport. 

Danville, ten miles below Rupert, is an important 
town, chiefly noted for its celebrated Montour Iron 
Works. The country from Rupert to Danville abounds 
in iron ore, and the scenery is characteristic for boldness. 

Danville is the shire town of Montour County, situ- 
ated on the north bank of the Susquehanna, at the en- 
trance of Mahoning Creek. It is twelve miles above 
Northumberland, and thirty miles north by east from 
Harrisburg. A large bridge here crosses the Susque- 
hanna. There are several churches and stores in the 
town, the population of which in 1850 numbered 3300 
inhabitants, and must now be at least double that num- 
ber. The greater portion of the town lies on ground 
considerably elevated above the creek, which we have to 
cross in order to reach the former. A few minutes walk 



70 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

after crossing brings us along the main street of the 
town to the Montour House, a commodious hotel. A 
little farther on is the Union House, from which it is but 
a step to the bridge across the Susquehanna in the rear 
of the town. If we cross this bridge we find ourselves 
in the open country, and, ascending the lofty hills to the 
right, we get an excellent view of the town and the 
river. 

ISTow let us retrace our steps to the creek, after re- 
crossing which we find ourselves in the iron part of the 
town, if we may so call it, for one sees or hears here 
nothing else than the working of iron. This is the busi- 
ness portion of the town, and here are the great iron- 
works, the furnaces, and the rolling-mills. If one should 
lose one's self on this side of the creek at night, he might 
easily conceive himself in some alien world, where there 
was nothing known, or wrought, or thought but iron. 
Every minute is told off by an explosive report of red- 
hot iron just fresh from the puddling furnace. In what- 
ever direction one turns his eye, tall chimneys surround 
him, surmounted by a crown of lurid flame, suggestive 
of smelting or melting iron beneath. Let him enter this 
limb of Pandemonium, and he shall find himself in a very 
wilderness of burning, hissing, cooling iron — iron in ev- 
ery shape and in every attitude — pig-iron, red-hot pig- 
iron, great crystal boulders of iron, now seen in the fur- 
nace, and the next moment riding about in every direc- 
tion on demoniacal go-carts, now dodging and now chas- 
ing one, till one seems to be a great red ball of iron him- 
self! 

Passing out of the rolling-mills, which are more exten- 
sive than those at Scranton, previously described, and 
climbing a hill to the right, we find ourselves in the fur- 
naces for smelting the ore. There are several of these. 
Now we pass out along the sloping hill-side into the 
dark, where great red-hot, scintillating, exploding iron 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 73 

wholesome fear in the breasts of all intruders, thought to 
secure himself from the world's troublesome society. 
There he lives, admitting to confraternity with himself 
only those choice spirits who can dare to be jolly even in 
a perpetually-falling house. 



X. 

SUNBURY TO HARRISBURG. 

Sunbury is about a mile below Northumberland, and 
is the shire town of Northumberland County. The 
Pennsylvania Canal is carried across the river by a basin, 
which the Shamokin Dam produces, 2783 feet long. A 
branch railroad connects Sunbury with the Shamokin 
Mines, which are nineteen miles east of the place. A 
bridge across the North Branch connects the town with 
Northumberland. It contains a court-house, a stone jail, 
and several churches. Coal, iron, and limestone are 
abundant in the vicinity, and there are some manufac- 
tures in the village. The population in 1850 was 1217. 
The railroad communication between Sunbury and 
Northumberland is by means of the Philadelphia and 
Erie Railroad. 

From Sunbury to Harrisburg is fifty-four miles vid 
the Northern Central Railway. The importance of this 
road, as establishing communication between Baltimore 
and the rich products of Northern and Eastern Penn- 
sylvania, can hardly be over-estimated. Like the Susque- 
hanna River along w T hich it extends, it receives tribu- 
taries from all parts of the state, until, near the mouth 
of said river, it reaches the Chesapeake at Baltimore. 

Passing Selins Grove, an unimportant station, and 
proceeding nine miles below Sunbury, we come to 

Trevorton Junction, the point of junction with the 
Trevorton Railroad. This branch road leads to the 

D 



74 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

mines of the Trevorton Coal Company. There is at 
this point a bridge across the river to convey the coal 
to the canal on the opposite side. Trevorton is forty- 
two miles from Harrisburg. 

Georgetoion^ five miles below the Junction, and thirty- 
seven from Harrisburg, is an unimportant station near 
Mali an tony Mountain. 

Mittersburg, nine miles farther on, is on the east bank 
of the Susquehanna, and at the mouth of Wisconisco 
Creek, in Dauphin County. It is in the vicinity of Ber- 
ry Mountain, and is the point of junction with the 
Lykens Valley Railroad, twenty-two miles in length, 
connecting with the Franklin, or Lykens Valley Coal 
Mines. 

Halifax, twenty-one miles from Harrisburg, is a post 
village in Dauphin County, drained by several creeks, 
which, on the western border of the town, enter the Sus- 
quehanna. It is situated in the midst of beautiful scen- 
ery, to which the mountains contribute the principal 
charm. The town has several grist, flour, and saw mills, 
and tanneries, and its population in 1850 was 2822. 

Claris Ferry is a station fourteen miles above Har- 
risburg. The river is dammed here to feed the Pennsyl- 
vania Canal. On the opposite side is the Susquehanna 
Canal. At Clark's Ferry we are opposite the mouth of 
the Juniata River, which is one of the chief affluents of 
the Susquehanna. This river is formed by the junction 
of Frankstown and Raystown branches, which rise in 
the Alleghany ridge, and flows eastwardly to its junc- 
tion with the Susquehanna, fifteen miles above Harris- 
burg. Along this river extends the Pennsylvania Cen- 
tral Railroad and the Pennsylvania Canal. 

Clark's Ferry is in the vicinity of Peter's Mountain. 
Indeed, from this point to Harrisburg the Susquehanna 
makes its way through mountains on each side ; the riv- 
er is very shallow, though of considerable width, and 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. %*l 

here, as throughout its course, is dotted at frequent in- 
tervals with small islands. At the junction of the, Juni- 
ata with the Susquehanna is 

Duncan'' s Island, now a favorite resort in summer for 
visitors from Harrisburg. The scenery in this vicinity 
has all the charming features, heightened to an unusual 
degree, which make the Susquehanna the most beautiful 
of American rivers. 

Dauphin, eight miles above Harrisburg, is a thriving 
village, which in 1850 contained a population of 1451 in- 
habitants. The line of the main division of the Penn- 
sylvania Canal passes through it. Dauphin is situated 
on the east bank of the river. Here is the junction of 
the Schuylkill and Susquehanna Railroad from Harris- 
burg to Auburn. 

Leaving Dauphin, we cross the river over the Dauphin 
Bridge, three quarters of a mile long, and proceed to 
Marysville, on the west bank. Here is the crossing of 
the Pennsylvania Central Railway. Near Marysville 
there is a natural dam, over which the river breaks gen- 
tly, and here its extreme shallowness is clearly visible. 

Fairvieio is a small village one or two miles above 
Harrisburg. Here there is a rolling-mill and extensive 
nail factories. Directly we are at Bridgeport, from 
which we recross the Susquehanna on the Cumberland 
Valley Railroad bridge, seven eighths of a mile long, to 

Harrisburg, the capital of Pennsylvania. The bor- 
ough received its name from John Harris, who laid it out 
in 1785. It became the state capital in 1812. 

It is situated on the east bank of the Susquehanna 
River, which has here great volume, yet is not easily 
navigable except for rafts, which the current takes down. 
There are seasons, however, when the freshets give the 
river a considerable depth. The borough is very con- 
veniently located in respect of canal and railroad com- 
munication, and is on this account a flourishing interior 



78 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

market. It has no less than seventeen churches and 
mission churches, two public halls, three banks, two an- 
thracite furnaces, two rolling-mills, and a number of 
founderies and machine shops, among which are those 
belonging to the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. It 
has also two female seminaries. The population in 1850 
was 8179, but must now number over 16,000. 

The borough has a beautiful situation on the banks of 
the river, inclosed on all sides by mountains, and enjoys 
the most uninterrupted health. It has in general all the 
improvements which belong to a great city, together 
with an excellent police. It is supplied with water 
through iron pipes from a reservoir on Mount Ayre, 
into which it is raised from the Susquehanna. This 
reservoir contains 1,532,195 gallons of water, and cost 
$120,000. There are several hotels, viz., Jones's, Herr's, 
Buehler's, the Brady, the Pennsylvania, and the United 
States. 

Harrisburg, as already indicated, is an important rail- 
road centre. Through the mountain passes northward 
extends the Northern Central Railroad to the great 
lakes ; through these same gaps the Pennsylvania Rail- 
road passes to the mighty West. To the right of these 
lies the Lebanon Valley Railroad, which, through its im- 
portant connection with the East Pennsylvania Railroad, 
conducts directly to New York City ; then across the 
river there is the Cumberland Valley Railroad to Cham- 
bersburg ; passing down the banks of the river is the 
continuation of the Northern Central to Baltimore ; and 
to Philadelphia there are two routes, one via Lebanon 
and Reading, and the other through Columbia and Lan- 
caster. 

Capitol Hill is beautifully located on an eminence, the 
grounds of which have been laid out with great care 
and taste, and inclosed with an iron fence. The Capitol 
is an imposing structure, consisting of a main building 



CENTRxlL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 79 

and two wings, each adorned with a portico and Doric 
pillars. The central edifice is 180 feet wide, 80 feet deep, 
and 100 feet high from the ground to the top of the- 
dome. This building contains the Senate and Represent- 
atives' Chambers, the State Library (up stairs), the Su- 
preme Court -rooms, and other apartments for the use 
of state officers. In the Representatives' Hall is to be 
seen the chair in which John Hancock sat as president 
of the Continental Congress. The Senate Chamber has 
portraits of William Penn, General Washington, Colum- 
bus, and Vespucius ; also a painting representing the at- 
tempt made by the Indians to burn John Harris. 

The incident referred to occurred on the river bank 
below the Railroad Bridge, where may still be seen the 
tree-stump to which the founder of the town had been 
tied by the savages, from which horrible situation he 
was rescued by a tribe from the other side. This stump 
is the one sole monument and headstone to John Har- 
ris's grave, and the people of the borough have sur- 
rounded it with an iron railing and a wilderness of 
flowers. 

There is one feature about Harrisburg, Lebanon, and 
Reading which gives them a novel appearance to a New- 
Yorker, and that is, the sort of markets which they con- 
tain. They stand in the centre of the street, and consist 
of long covered inclosures open at the sides ; and within, 
the huge blocks upon which the butcher and the dairy- 
man display their tempting meats and fruits form a 
pleasant picture to look upon. 

We ought, before leaving Harrisburg, to say that the 
rebel invasion of Pennsylvania, which so nearly threaten- 
ed the town, and the preparations made by the citizens 
to repel it, the tokens of which will remain for years, 
will hereafter give an additional interest to the vicinity 
in the eyes of tourists. 



80 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 



XL 

HAERISBURG TO BEADING — THE LEBANON VALLEY. 

Having reached the southern limit of our route, we 
now turn our faces northward across the Lebanon Val- 
ley to Reading, vid the Lebanon Valley Railroad. The 
great feature of the country between Harrisburg and 
Reading is the extraordinary richness of the soil. A 
ride of ten miles brings us to 

Hummelstown, in Dauphin County, on the Swatara 
Creek (which empties into the Susquehanna). Its pop- 
ulation in 1850 was 620. 

Palmyra, six miles farther east, is in Lebanon County. 
The country is very different from that upon our route 
hitherto : we have come from coal-fields and mountain- 
ous districts into a wide-spread garden of clover and 
wheat-fields. Through this rich region we proceed ten 
miles farther, when we reach 

Lebanon, the shire town of the county, situated almost 
exactly half way between Harrisburg and Reading, being 
twenty-six miles from the former and twenty-eight from 
the latter. It is drained by the Swatara, is uneven in 
surface, and very fertile. The county is one of the most 
productive in the state. Land is nowhere in the town 
of Lebanon less than from $150 to $200 per acre. The 
Union Canal passes through the town thirty-eight miles 
from Middletown, its terminus on the Susquehanna. The 
town has two furnaces, several stores, besides two large 
warehouses on the canal. In 1850 the population of the 
borough was 3000, of the town 7360. 

Here the tourist will stop in order to pay a visit to 
the Cornwall Ore Banks, about seven miles distant, tak- 
ing for that purpose the North Lebanon Railway. 



CENTRAL EAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 



81 




IKON HILLS AT COENWALL-. 



The interesting feature connected with these banks is 
the vast amount of iron ore lying open to the eye, as in 
vast heaps purposely piled up by Mature within easy 
reach of the human hand. 

There are three hills, viz., two on the right hand of the 
railway, as you enter, called' the Grassy Hill and the 
Middle Hill respectively, and another on the left called 
the Big Hill, from its size. These are made up of solid 
iron ore, lying millions upon millions of tons in plain 
sight above the water level. It has been estimated that 
Big Hill alone contains 40,000,000 tons of iron ore above 
the surface, a great pile which the eye can take in at a 
glance, but which, reckoning the ore at the price which 
it brings as lying in the ground (forty cents per ton), is 
worth nearly $16,000,000. 

For convenience, the ore is mined by terraces, and the 
ore, after being blasted and broken, is rolled down a 
slope to cars which convey it to the railway. Consider- 
able amounts of copper have been found mixed with the 
iron. 

If we move up the hill we shall meet a great number 
of heavy lumber -wagons, filled, as it would seem, with 
nothing but dirt. It is not dirt, however, but the precious 
iron ore, which is collected even in these small particles 

D 2 



82 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

of dust and shipped to market. Beyond the Ore Banks 
may be seen an extensive area covered with charcoal pits 
for the use of the charcoal furnaces near by. 

Returning to Lebanon, and continuing our course 
along the Lebanon Valley, we come to the village of 

Myerstown, on Tulpehocken Creek and Union Canal, 
seven miles from Lebanon and thirty-three miles from 
Harrisburg. 

Womelsclorf is in Berks County, on the south side of 
Tulpehocken Creek, thirty-nine miles from Harrisburg. 
Its inhabitants are mostly Germans. It is situated in 
the midst of a finely-cultivated district, and contains sev- 
eral mills and stores. Population in 1850 was 950. A 
ride of fifteen miles brings us to the city of 

Reading, the capital of Berks County, situated on the 
east bank of the Schuylkill, fifty-four miles east of Har- 
risburg. It was laid out in 1748 by Richard and Thom- 
as Penn, proprietaries of the province, and is therefore 
one of the oldest towns in the state. It was settled 
chiefly by Germans, and it has continued mainly German 
to the present day. The population in 1850 was 15,748, 
but is now, doubtless, more than 30,000. 

The streets are very regularly laid out. The court- 
house in the central square is 200 feet long by 220 deep, 
and has a splendid portico, with six columns of red sand- 
stone: its cost was $59,000. There are three public li- 
braries in the town, and thirteen churches. 

The position of Reading makes it an active commer- 
cial and manufacturing centre. This is in great measure 
due to its facilities of communication with the interior 
of the anthracite coal region on the one hand, and with 
the principal markets along the sea-board on the other. 
The Schuylkill Navigation Canal, extending from Port 
Carbon, above Pottsville, to Philadelphia, passes through 
Reading, and from Reading starts the Union Canal to 
Middletown, on the Susquehanna. The town lies within 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 85 

fifty-eight miles of Philadelphia vid the Philadelphia and 
Reading Railroad (extending northward to Pottsville), 
and it is only 127 miles from New York, a half day's 
ride. Thus in every direction it communicates with per- 
fect ease. 

There are various large manufactories in Reading. 
One anthracite blast furnace has an annual capacity of 
3500 tons; two. charcoal furnaces have each over 1000 
tons capacity ; there is a forge, also, of 600 tons, three 
charcoal forges, two rolling-mills, and, in the days when 
cotton was king, there was a cotton-mill producing its 
8000 yards daily. There are also large flouring-mills, 
a nail factory, breweries, tanneries, a pottery, lumber- 
yards, and nearly every species of manufacturing known. 
White wines are manufactured here, and the manufac- 
ture of hats for the Southern and Western markets has 
been in past years a large business. 

The Schuylkill is spanned at Reading by two covered 
bridges 600 feet long, at a cost of $60,000. A spring on 
Penn's Mount, the water of which is conducted to a res- 
ervoir, and thence distributed over the city in pipes, fur- 
nishes a supply of fresh water. 

In order to obtain a good view of the city, let one as- 
cend the heights which overlook it, or let him pass 
through the city up to the Catholic cemetery, from 
which the view is very beautiful. The town itself, like 
too many Pennsylvania boroughs, presents to the eye 
too much red brick, which may be more durable than 
wood, but it is far from being pleasant to the eye. 



86 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 



XII. 

BEADING TO ALLENTOWN. 

The ride from Reading to Allentown embraces thirty- 
six miles vid the East Pennsylvania Railroad. It leads 
through a fertile country, which, in respect of its uniform 
richness of soil, is a fit continuation of that which we 
have just traversed. The air of a quiet independence 
broods over the whole country, with its wide-spread 
acres and its happy farm-houses, from Harrisburg to 
Easton. The road between Reading and Allentown has 
only been completed about three years (1863), but al- 
ready, in the numerous stations which have sprung up 
along its line, evidence is given of its stimulating influ- 
ence upon the agricultural pojDulation of the valley ; and 
although many of the stations are hardly worthy of an 
especial notice in this Guide-book, as, for instance, the 
first three which occur, viz., Temple's, five, JBlandon 's, 
eight, and Fleetwood, eleven miles from Reading, still it 
is to be remembered that they are but the beginnings 
of future boroughs, which the surrounding agricultural 
wealth must rapidly nourish into extensive and flourish- 
ing communities. 

Lyons, fifteen miles from Reading, is a station of 
greater importance, still, like the others, of recent growth. 
Passing over the unimportant stations, Bowers, sixteen, 
Topton, nineteen, Shamrock, twenty-one, and Millers- 
town, twenty-six miles from Reading, we come to 

Emmaus, in Lehigh County, thirty miles from Read- 
ing. This is a Moravian village at the foot of South 
Mountain, and built in one street. Like most Moravian 
towns, it is the namesake of a town in Scripture, as is the 
case with Bethlehem, Nazareth, and others. The site of 
the town was bequeathed by two brethren for the sup- 



CENTRAL railroad of new jersey. 87 

port and promotion of missions. The next station is Al- 
lentown, on the Lehigh River. 



XIII. 

WILKESBARRE TO ALLENTOWN. 

Instead of proceeding directly on our way, vid East on, 
to New York, let us first return to Wilkesbarre, or rather 
imagine ourselves back at the Phoenix Hotel in that 
quiet town. We shall then have two courses before us. 
One of these is that which we have been pursuing, and 
which, by a circuitous route, has brought us to Allen- 
town. The other, which we are now to take, conducts 
to the same destination, but over a direct route along 
the Lehigh Valley. 

The Lehigh Valley Railroad Company are construct- 
ing a road which shall connect Wilkesbarre directly with 
their route already completed from Mauch Chunk to 
Allentown. This branch goes by the name of the Penn 
Haven and White Haven Railway, and, after ascending 
and again descending the mountain eastward from 
Wilkesbarre, strikes the head-waters of the Lehigh. 
The first station after leaving Wilkesbarre, and about 
twenty miles from that place, is 

White Haven. This town is situated on the Lehigh 
River, twenty-five miles above Mauch Chunk. It was 
begun in 1835, and received its name from Josiah White. 
In 1842 it was incorporated as a borough, at which time 
it had a population of 1500. The lumber business is the 
most prominent. The Lehigh and Susquehanna Rail- 
way, which has its terminus at White Haven, was orig- 
inally intended for the conveyance of boats from the 
Susquehanna navigation at Wilkesbarre to that of the 
Lehigh, but the project was abandoned. 

About a mile below White Haven is the tannery of 



GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 




VIEW ON THE LEHIGH EIVEK AT WHITE HAVEN. 



Messrs. Smull and Sons, said to be the largest in the 
United States. The main building is 680 feet long, and 
the number of sides annually tanned 80,000. 

Here we take the Penn Haven and White Haven 
Railway for Mauch Chunk. Our course lies along the 
Lehigh River all the way, and runs through a mountain- 
ous country, which affords scenery which, in picturesque 
effect, is without a rival. This is particularly true of 
that portion of the road which lies just above Mauch 
Chunk. Just below White Haven we cross the Lehigh, 
and keep along its left bank until w r e reach a point inid- 
w T ay between Rockport and Penn Haven, where we re- 
cross the stream. 

Rockport is on the opposite bank from the railroad, 
thirteen miles above Mauch Chunk. The place has 
grown up in connection with the operations of the Buck 
Mountain Coal Company, whose mines are about four 
miles from the village, at a place called Clifton. Rock- 
port is merely the shipping-point for these mines. The 
fine mountain air and the picturesque scenery, added to 
the facility of communication established by the Penn 
Haven Railroad, w T ill make it a delightful summer resort. 
Eight miles above Mauch Chunk is the village of - 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 91 

Penn Haven, situated at the junction of Quakake 
Creek with the Lehigh River. From 1838 to 1852 the 
Hazleton Railroad Company used the Beaver Meadow 
Railroad from Hazle Creek to Penn Haven. After the 
freshet of 1850 they built a separate road to the top of 
the mountain at Penn Haven, from which the coal cars 
are let down by inclined planes on the other side, 430 
feet high and 1200 feet long, to the Lehigh, where the 
coal is transferred to boats. The loaded cars, descend- 
ing, draw up the empty cars. In 1859 another inclined 
plane was constructed for the purpose of letting down 
cars to a level with the Beaver Meadow Railroad, over 
which they are conveyed to the Lehigh Valley Road. 
The scenery from the head of these planes is magnificent. 

From Penn Haven let the reader, before proceeding to 
Mauch Chank, imagine himself back at White Haven ; 
for, besides the Penn Haven and White Haven Railroad, 
there is another route, more indirect, but affording feat- 
ures so characteristic that we shall describe it, for the 
purpose of directing the tourist's attention to this pleas- 
ant detour. Until the opening of the railroad in 1864 it 
was the main route, and the only one connecting Mauch 
Chunk with Wilkesbarre. 

From White Haven we have a stage - ride of seven 
miles in length to 

Ecklet, on the top of Buck Mountain, situated in Fos- 
ter Township, Luzerne County, and one of the most beau- 
tiful mining villages in the state. The site of the village 
in 1854 was a complete wilderness. The ride up Buck 
Mountain is one of unsurpassed grandeur, and the most 
attractive feature connected with it is that the natural 
scenery which we behold has been, as yet, almost un- 
touched by man. Just as we reach the summit of the 
mountain, let us turn back to look over the scene which 
we have left behind us. The valley, down into which 
we look from a height of 1700 feet above tide -water 



92 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

level, is just as God made it, the one solitary vestige of 
human workmanship being the long and winding road 
over which we have slowly made our way around the 
sides of the mountain. We will commend the reader to 
the scene as it has been portrayed by the artist. 

Eckley is a very good example of the kind of village 
which rapidly springs up about mines. Between 1854 
and 1860 over 150 tenements, besides five neat cottages, 
had been built. There were also erected three school- 
houses, two churches, and a fine hotel. As regards the 
latter, we have never found, in our travels, a better table 
set than here, even where we have had to pay twice the 
sum for our entertainment. 

The collieries of Messrs. Sharp and Leisering located 
here are known as the Council Ridge. The* coal mined 
here is of a superior quality,' probably the very best for 
steam-boat and railroad uses. In opening the mines a 
point has been selected on what is called the anticlinal 
axis of the two basins, and a slope from this point has 
been driven north and south into each basin, one break- 
er sufficing for both slopes. The two basins together 
are capable of producing 120,000 tons of coal per year. 

Leaving Eckley we take the Hazleton Railroad. This 
road was completed to Weatherly in 1838, where it con- 
nected with the Beaver Meadow Railroad. In 1851 the 
road was continued to Penn Haven, making the whole 
length fourteen miles. After proceeding a short dis- 
tance from Eckley we find our direction completely re- 
versed, and ourselves moving back along the edge of 
Dreck Creek Ledge to 

Hazleton, one of the most enterprising towns in the 
coal region, and situated twenty-three miles above Mauch 
Chunk, on a ridge which divides the Susquehanna from 
the Lehigh Basin. The town is of the same elevation as 
Eckley, which we have just left. Within two miles of 
the borough there are eleven openings of mines worked 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 93 

by different companies, which produce about 250,000 
tons of coal yearly, which is carried over the Hazleton 
Railroad to Penn Haven, where it is shipped by canal, 
or transferred to the Beaver Meadow, and thence to the 
Lehigh Valley Railroad. These mines were opened in 
1837. The town was incorporated in 1857, and contains 
about 1500 inhabitants, three churches, five schools, four 
hotels, a brewery, a grist-mill, and the car and machine 
shops of the Hazleton Railroad and Coal Company. The 
scenery at this point is remarkably wild and picturesque. 
From Hazleton w^e return to 

Stockton. Two miles from Hazleton is a small mining 
village named after Commodore Stockton, of New Jer- 
sey. Here are worked the East Sugar-loaf Coal Mines, 
opened in 1850 by* Packer, Carter & Co. They are 
worked by three slopes, capable each of yielding 50,000 
tons per year. The coal is unsurpassed by any other for 
its excellence. The population is about 1000. 

At Hazle Creek we take the Beaver Meadow Railroad, 
about one and a half miles above Weatherly. The Bea- 
ver Meadow Road leads to the celebrated Spring Mount- 
ain coal mines in the vicinity of Jeansville, whence, from 
three openings, are sent to market some 150,000 tons 
per year. In the neighborhood of Jeansville are sev- 
eral mining villages. Passing through ^Beaver Meadow, 
four miles below Jeansville, the road proceeds to Hazle 
Creek. 

Weatherly is fourteen miles above Mauch Chunk. It 
contains 600 inhabitants. One mile and a quarter below 
the village, the Quakake Railroad, thirteen miles long, 
connects the Beaver Meadow with the Catawissa Rail- 
road. Six miles below Weatherly is the village of Penn 
Haven, already described. A few miles farther on, the 
jSTesquehoning Valley opens on the right, through which 
the Nesquehoning Railroad is projected, to develop the 
mines of the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company, and 



94 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

make a connection with the Catawissa Railroad which 
will shorten the distance some twelve miles. From Penn 
Haven a ride of eight miles brings us to 

Mauch Chunk, the Switzerland of America. The 
scenery as we approach the town from above baffles de- 
scription. Rugged mountain spurs, towering above the 
ordinary level of the ridge, which on either side closes in 
the Lehigh all along its course, break off abruptly as they 
reach the river, and we seem to pass between massive 
mountain colonnades adown the black, hemlock -steep- 
ing Lehigh. Sometimes an abrupt turn in the river ef- 
fects a sudden change as in dissolving panoramic views. 
Passing at one time, as it would seem, directly into the 
mountains ahead, we make a rapid curve in the road, 
and a new picture, in which granddur and beauty meet, 
is presented before us. Even the highlands along the 
Hudson will not compare with these in the matter of 
picturesqueness. 

Through these gateways of natural magnificence we 
enter the town of Mauch Chunk itself, the capital of Car- 
bon County, and the centre of the Lehigh Coal Basin. 
It is 89 miles from Philadelphia and 121 from New York. 

The town is small in area, and is situated at the junc- 
tion of Mauch Chunk Creek with Lehigh River, being 
on all sides surmounted by mountains more than a thou- 
sand feet high. The name is Indian, and signifies Bear 
Mountain. 

In 1818 the whole country in this vicinity was a com- 
plete wilderness. It was known, indeed, that anthracite 
coal was to be found here, but every attempt to get it 
to market had been baffled. In 1817, Josiah White, ac- 
companied by G. F. Hanto, visited this region for the 
purposes of reconnoissance, the object of which was to 
ascertain the feasibility of using the Lehigh River to 
convey the coal to market. The prospect was any thing 
but encouraging, but it was determined to commence 



1 


■ . 'Vj! 
lllll 


if 




CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 9) 

operations. Accordingly, roads were made from the 
mines to the Lehigh, and upon the latter were built a se- 
ries of dams to aid the navigation by slack water. Thus 
was established the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Com- 
pany, with which enterprise the early history of Mauch 
Chunk is identified. 

In 1832 the dependencies of this company gave em- 
ployment to 400 men, principally miners, who, with their 
families, made a population of 2000. After passing 
through many a perilous crisis, and after an expense of 
two and a half millions of dollars, the enterprise was at 
last consummated. 

In 1830 the population of Mauch Chunk was 700; in 
1840, 1200; in 1850, 2557. The principal manufacto- 
ries of the town are two founderies and machine shops, 
two iron forges, a screen and wire factory, a wire rope 
manufactory, a steam flour-mill, three boat-yards, and 
two shoe nactories. Besides these there are the machine 
and repair shops of the Lehigh Canal and Navigation 
Company, and the car repair shops of the Lehigh Valley 
Railroad |Company. 

The mines, however, constitute the central business 
concern of Mauch Chunk. One reason why they are to 
be especially noticed is the excellence of the Lehigh coal, 
being the hardest anthracite in the world. Besides, ev- 
ery facility is afforded, through the inclined planes and 
the Gravity and Switch-back Railroad, for visiting the 
mines, which are readily laid open to the view, being for 
the most part worked by slopes. 

The road by which the visitor is carried about the 
mines, including the whole circuit to Summit Hill, and 
from thence around among the Parker Creek mines, and 
back again, vid Summit Hill, to Mauch Chunk, is about 
twenty-five miles in length. 

Starting from the Mansion House, we proceed along 
the main street of the town (and so narrow is the defile 

E 






98 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

between the mountains that there can be but one street), 
we pass the court-house and jail at the foot of the hill, 
and ascend by a wagon road to an elevated plateau at 
the foot of the great plane. In doing so we must pass 
the beautiful mansion of Judge Packer, with its elegant 
grounds, laid out by a Parisian refugee, the head garden- 
er of Louis Philippe. You would hardly believe that, 
four years ago, this rich garden, with its irregularly-beau- 
tiful walks and its terraces, the walls of which are form- 
ed of conglomerate rock overgrown with myrtle, and its 
fountains, was but an ordinary barren, rugged hill-slope, 
like any other which you may now select among the 
rough mountains on every side. The very soil has been 
created, the conglomerate rock brought from a great dis- 
tance, and altogether the old gardener, who a few years 
ago made his way from Eckley down into the town to 
solicit an opportunity to labor, has made a fair conquest 
over Nature, and built himself a monument. 

Upon the plateau we find that portion of the village 
situated which is called Upper Mauch Chunk. Here we 
are 215 feet above the river. At intervals we behold 
descending the inclined planes before us a train of cars 
from the mines laden with coal, which pass us by means 
of shutes extending to the Lehigh River; at the same 
time, a train of empty cars ascends. The road over 
which these cars have come was originally a turnpike, 
and the coal was brought down to Mauch Chunk in 
wagons drawn by two horses ; but the increase in the 
demand for coal hurried up these operations. The turn- 
pike, under the superintendence of Josiah White, was 
converted into a railroad, which was the second con- 
structed in the United States (one having previously 
been laid in Quincy, Mass.). This was accomplished in 
1827. During that year 32,074 tons of coal were car- 
ried over this road. In 1859 the amount carried was 
450,000 tons. Up to 1845 the empty cars were drawn 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 101 

up the mountain by mules, who were then placed on a 
train of full cars down, in which they all " took a ride," 
presenting a very ludicrous sight to the uninitiated 
stranger. 

It was the great desire of Josiah White's latter days, 
and one which he lived to see realized, to have the cars 
descend back again into the mines from Summit Hill by 
gravitation, and then, being drawn up a considerable ele- 
vation, to descend again on the other side, by a return 
track, back to Summit Hill. This is now accomplished 
by the wonderful contrivance called the switch-back, 
completed in 1845, which we shall soon explain. 

Stepping into a covered car, about one third the size 
of an ordinary railroad car, with a safety-car attached be- 
hind, and signaling to the engineer at the top of the 
plane, we commence the ascent, being drawn upward as 
by some magic, but invisible power, into the very clouds. 
Here, then, we are at the top of Mount Pisgah, having 
been drawn up the distance of 2332 feet, and being, at 
the top, nearly 700 feet above the foot of the plane. The 
novelty of this rare mode of traveling is, however, quite 
forgotten in the sublimity of the prospect with which the 
eye, looking from this vast height, is filled. Below us 
lies Mauch Chunk, which we look upon as a bird or an 
aeronaut might ; towering above it rise the grand spurs 
of mountains, with the river winding its way among 
them, and above, range after range, like an aerial flight 
of stairs, ascend the distant mountain ridges, which, re- 
ceding farther and farther into the distance as they rise, 
give us, instead of the contracted view from the foot of 
the plane, one of the widest reach and magnificence 
which we have ever seen or shall see ever, though we 
ascend the "White Mountains or the Swiss Alps. Trav- 
elers uniformly speak of this view in terms of the great- 
est enthusiasm, but, after having once seen it ourselves, 
we can not think them extravagant. The crowning 



102 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

point of the scene is the Lehigh Water Gap, which 
above the topmost mountain range lifts its perfectly de- 
fined walls, through which a passage is afforded into the 
unseen valleys beyond. 

Now we push ourselves away again, descending for 
nine miles upon a downward grade, our own weight an- 
swering for a locomotive. At first, to the timorous, there 
comes a suspicion of insecurity ; but no one has ever been 
mortally injured since the road was made, and the break 
is always sufficient to check the too swift motion of the 
car. Very soon, though, the novelty and excitement of 
the ride make us wish that the conductor would put on 
all the speed in his power. As we glide rapidly around 
the mountain we have some very beautiful views of the 
valley beneath us. 

In about twenty minutes we reach the foot of a sec- 
ond inclined plane, which draws us up to the very sum- 
mit of Mount Pisgah, nine miles from Mauch Chunk. 
This point is called Summit Hill, to the north of which 
lie the collieries of Panther Creek. Taking an open car, 
we move on in this direction. But here we are aston- 
ished with a second novelty. In order to make the cir- 
cuit among the mines, and return back again to Summit 
Hill, it is necessary that the line of direction should be 
frequently changed. A continuous path, having precise- 
ly the slopes required for this change, it would be impos- 
sible to find ; it is therefore accomplished by taking a 
zigzag course, which accommodates itself to the nature 
of the ground. The contrivance for changing the direc- 
tion of the car at every angle of this zigzag course is 
called a switch-back. The car here, with the impetus 
which it has gained in descending a given slope, moves 
part of the way up an eminence, and comes to a stand- 
still. Of course the car must again descend to the foot 
of this slight eminence, and in so doing it gains an im- 
petus for ascending another slope, on to which it is 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 103 

moved by a self-regulating switch, and this is what is 
called being switched back. The two slopes, together 

with the eminence, form the letter ^fi . The arm A is 



a slope descending toward the base of the letter, this 
base representing the eminence up which the car is car- 
ried, and down which it returns, being then switched off 
to the arm B, which descends from the eminence. Upon 
the way an opportunity is given to visit the mines. The 
coal measures are deeper here than any where else in 
the country, and are mined at the surface as in a quarry. 

By the circuitous switch-back route we have passed 
from the top of Mount Pisgah back again to one of its 
bases, where we are now drawn up two inclined planes, 
and are ready to make the descent back to Mauch Chunk. 
The ride is all the way among the most romantic wood- 
land scenery, which, connected with the novelty and the 
swiftness of our movements, is the crowning charm of 
this strange and delightful route. 

From Mauch Chunk our course follows the river down 
vid the Lehigh Valley Railroad. We now leave the 
coal region entirely. The first station which is reached 
is 

Lehighton, a small village four miles below Mauch 
Chunk, and just above the junction of Mahoning Creek 
with the Lehigh. The old Moravian grave-yard is an 
object of considerable interest, and, from its lofty situa- 
tion, commands a favorable view of the Mahoning Val- 
ley. At the foot of the hill is the site of Gnadenhutten, 
which in 1775 was attacked by the Indians, and twelve 
of the inhabitants massacred. Their remains are laid in 
the grave-yard above. Opposite Lehighton is 

Weissport, on the eastern or left bank of the river. 
This whole section was originally occupied by Moravi- 
ans. The village contains an extensive rolling-mill. Fort 
Allen Hotel rests upon the site of the old Fort Allen, 



104 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

which was built by Benjamin Franklin ; and a well con- 
structed by the same person is still to be seen. 

This neighborhood was once the scene of Edward 
Brainard's missionary labors. The next place on our 
route is 

Parry mile, two miles below Weissport, on the eastern 
bank of the river, near its junction with Big Creek. Here 
there is an anthracite furnace, erected in 1855, and called 
the Poco Poco Iron Works. Now it is called the Car- 
bon Iron Company, and has a capital of $100,000. The 
ore used is mostly mined in the vicinity along Stony 
Ridge. Between Parry ville and the Lehigh Water Gap 
are Breinig & Brother's extensive paint mines for their 
works at Allentown. The mines produce eleven differ- 
ent colors, equal, it is said, to those which are imported. 
In our passage to 

Lehigh Gap we pass over Lizard Creek, upon which 
are several mills. The river, by means of the Gap, effects 
a passage through Blue Mountain. This range now lines 
the river for several miles on either side, furnishing many 
very picturesque mountain scenes. Opposite the station 
a chain bridge crosses the Lehigh. 

Slatington, thirteen miles below Mauch Chunk, and 
thirty-three above Easton, is a beautiful village, occupied 
chiefly by the Welsh employed in the extensive quarries 
and factories of the Lehigh Slate Company. This is 
probably the most extensive slate region in the world. 
The Capitol at Washington has been roofed with slate 
from these mines one half an inch in thickness. The vil- 
lage has both a beautiful and healthy location, which has 
made it attractive to strangers as a place of residence. 
From the bridge across the river an excellent view is ob- 
tained of the Gap, which is two miles above. 

Rockdale, four miles farther down the river, and 

Laurys, two miles beyond Rockdale, are hardly any 
thing more than stations. Large quantities of iron ore 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 105 

are mined in the neighborhood, and sent to different fur- 
naces along the Lehigh. Slate also is extensively mined 
here. From this beautiful district a ride of two miles 
brings us to 

White Hall, a small village of no great importance. 
Here are Eckert & Co.'s Hydraulic Cement Works. The 
cement is mined near by, and is said to equal Rosen- 
dale's. 

Coplay, two miles below, contains the works of the 
Lehigh Iron Company, and half a mile below it is 

Hokendauqua, a pleasant village on the bank of the 
river, where are located the Thomas Iron Works, consist- 
ing of two furnaces — the largest, and having the most 
powerful blast machinery in the country, except the 
works at Bethlehem, mentioned hereafter. The name of 
the village comes from the creek which here empties 
into the river. 

Through all the places which we have named runs the 
Lehigh Canal, having its eastern terminus at Easton. 
The extensive freshet of 1862 materially injured the 
works, so that above Mauch Chunk its operations have 
been suspended. It was, indeed, the numerous dams of 
this canal that gave to this freshet its fearful propor- 
tions. These were built at short intervals up to the very 
source of the Lehigh ; and, considering the narrowness 
of the defile among the mountains which the Lehigh Val- 
ley makes, it is easy to conceive the result of an inunda- 
tion which should break down, one after another, these 
barriers, thus emptying gigantic floods of water, in swift 
succession, upon the unfortunate valley below. In an 
hour's time the river rose to the second story of houses 
in Mauch Chunk along the stream ; and many lives were 
lost, besides the vast amount of valuable property which 
was destroyed. In this village of Hokendauqua there is 
said to have occurred a most marvelous instance of jDres- 
ervation from what seemed the inevitable destruction of 

E 2 



106 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

two children. Their father, wishing to remove some val- 
uable property to a place of security, thought his time 
sufficient to allow of his return before their safety would 
be at all imperiled ; but, on returning, he found that the 
waters had made access to his house impossible. After 
the recession of the waters, which was as sudden as their 
rise, it was found that the flood, entering the house, had 
floated the bed upon which the little ones were lying, 
and, raising it to the ceiling, had pressed it upward so 
closely as, by partial suffocation, to have saved the chil- 
dren even from the touch of the water. 

One mile below Hokendauqua is 

Catasauqua, which is three miles above Allentown. 
Its population is over 3000, and it contains five iron fur- 
naces belonging to the Lehigh Iron Crane Company. Its 
position on the railroad and canal, and in the midst of a 
country rich in iron ore and limestone, is highly favora- 
ble to its future growth. The Catasauqua and Fogels- 
ville Railroad here connects with the Lehigh Valley 
Road. This road was built to reach the iron ore beds 
belonging to the Lehigh Crane and the Thomas Iron 
Works. About 150,000 tons of ore are shipped over 
the road annually. Three miles below Catasauqua, and 
twenty-nine below Mauch Chunk, we reach Allentown, 
and are ready to move on, as we should have done by 
the longer route via Easton to New York. 



XIV. 

ALLENTOWN TO EASTON. 

Allentown, the capital of Lehigh County, on the Le- 
high River. The'town was incorporated in 1826. It is 
situated at the junction of Lehigh River and Little Le- 
high Creek, seventeen miles from Easton, sixty from 
Philadelphia, and ninety-two from New York. 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 107 

Its name was derived from that of its founder, James 
Allen, who laid it out in 1762. William Allen, James's 
father, owned in 1760 three thousand acres of land in the 
County of Lehigh ; this all fell to James, who died in 
1777, leaving it to his descendants. 

In 1764 there existed thirteen houses, or shanties, in 
Allentown ; the inhabitants were wretchedly off, being 
mostly Germans. In 1776 there were fifty-four houses, 
seven of which were taverns. At this time James Allen 
received ground-rent from seventy-one lots, at the rate 
of nine shillings sterling for each lot. 

It is said that the bells of Christ Church, Philadelphia, 
when that city was taken by the British in 1777, were 
brought to Allentown for concealment. 

Although laid out a century ago, the town has lost 
nearly all traces of this antiquity, and looks very much 
like a modern town. It is built upon elevated ground, 
commanding an extensive prospect. Its position at the 
junction of the East Pennsylvania and the Lehigh Val- 
ley Railroads is a favorable circumstance for the growth 
of the place. Its elevated situation, on a sort of prom- 
ontory which slopes down to Lehigh River and Jordan 
Creek, was for a time a considerable hinderance to its 
growth on account of the difficulty of obtaining water ; 
but in 1828 this impediment was removed by the erec- 
tion of water-works, by means of which the town is sup- 
plied with the purest spring water from Worman's 
Spring, about a mile distant. The water is forced to a 
height of 160 feet into a reservoir, from which it is dis- 
tributed over the town. The town is also supplied with 
gas by the Allen Gas Company. 

During the last few years the manufacturing interest 
has been largely developed. There are fifty-seven man- 
ufactories in operation, among which are seven for the 
manufacture of agricultural implements, two foundery 
and machine shops, one iron-railing factory, a planing- 



108 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

mill, a paint factory, five carriage factories, a railroad 
spike, an axle, a file, and a piano manufactory, two shoe 
factories, a gun factory, two distilleries, two breweries, 
four iron furnaces belonging to the Allentown Iron Com- 
pany, and a rolling-mill. Several other rolling-mills and 
iron-works are commenced, and more are planned. 

The Allentown Iron-works produce 20,000 tons of 
pig-iron per annum. They are blown by steam, and the 
ore used is mined in the vicinity. They are situated 
near the Lehigh Valley Railroad. 

The Lehigh River, a tributary of the Delaware, rises 
in Luzerne County, near Wilkesbarre, and to a short 
distance below Allentown runs in a southwesterly course, 
but here it is met by the Lehigh Hills, and compelled to 
take an easterly course. Before the dams were built in 
this river it used to abound both in trout and shad. 

It may be of interest to state that the old Allen house, 
or " Trout Hall," as it was called, a hunting-lodge built 
by William Allen, is still standing. It is a stone cottage, 
massive enough to stand the brunt of centuries to come. 
It is too bad to have to reflect, after all, that the old judge 
was a Tory ! 

The Lehigh Valley Road continues down the river as 
far as to Easton. Although we have left the mountain 
ranges behind us, and can find no scenes so picturesque 
as those which so frequently occur along the upper basin 
of the river, yet the eye is every where refreshed with 
the quiet beauty of the variegated landscape. The coun- 
try, too, grows richer as we approach the borders of the 
state. 

The only places of prominent interest along the road 
from this point are Bethlehem and Easton. 

Bethlehem, which is five miles below Allentown, is 
chiefly distinguished as being one of the oldest of the 
Moravian settlements in this country. The Moravians, 
as is well known, at first settled in Georgia, and it was 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 



109 



in 1738 that the settlement was broken up in that state 
(on account of the war raging between England and 
Spain, in which the Brethren were compelled to serve), 
and their attention directed to Pennsylvania. The ob- 
ject of the Moravian settlements was the conversion of 
the Indians to Christianity. The somewhat ascetic life 
of the Moravians was rather an assistance to them in 
this sort of enterprise. They hold all property in com- 
mon ; the support of the aged and infirm was made a 
general concern ; and even the regulation of marriages 
was a matter in which the individuals directly concerned 
had less to do than any body else. 




VIEW AT BETHLEHEM. 



The settlement at Bethlehem, which was the earliest 
in Pennsylvania, retained its original economy and regi- 
men longer than any other. This is due to the outward 
pressure which was continually brought to bear against 
it. The Germans and Irish both looked upon a Herrn- 
hutter with the extremest contempt; the union, there- 
fore, between the Brethren themselves was confirmed 
and strengthened. The separation of the sexes and the 
community in property existed as late as 1762. From 



1 10 GtriDE-BOOK OF TliJ£ 

this date the distinctive characteristics of the Moravians 
have more and more ceased to be noticeable. 

The old buildings, though, for the most part, still re- 
main, and afford the tourist objects of curious interest. 
The most important of these are situated in Church How, 
which is at the foot of the street leading to the Sun Ho- 
tel. The buildings are built of stone, and suggest great 
possibilities of endurance for generations yet to come. 
Here the infirm and the aged are still supported by the 
Brethren as of old. 

The old grave-yard of the Moravians will well repay 
the tourist for the trouble of visiting it. It is in the cen- 
tre of the town, and is full of graves. It is interesting 
to walk through between the long rows of stones which 
lie as a cover upon the old graves, and to decipher their 
inscriptions, which oftentimes it is difficult to make out; 
besides that, the grass overgrows and veils them from in- 
quisitive eyes. Here are none of the discriminations of 
fashionable life. Indians, negroes, and white men are 
laid side by side, and their ashes mingle together. That 
lovo which led the followers of Zinzendorf across the 
sea to enlighten the mind of the poor Indian, still holds 
him in spite of the chains of death. From all parts of 
the world has the human dust of this cemetery been 
gathered. Here, for instance, arc three graves side by 
side ; one of them owes its burden to London, another 
to the province of Silesia, and the third to Ilerrnhutt. 

The town is very regularly laid out, and a pleasant 
feature connected with it is the abundance of shade-trees. 
Considerable of the historic interest belonging to the 
town is due to the fact that Washington, iu his retreat 
across the Delaware, was compelled to remove his hos- 
pital and supplies to Bethlehem. The Brethren gave up 
their buildings to the government, and on one occasion 
these were occupied by a large body of British prison- 
ers. In this way the town came to be honored by many 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. Ill 

distinguished heroes of that day, e. g., Washington, Ad- 
ams, Lafayette, Pulaski, Gates, Hancock, and Franklin. 
The single sisters gave Count Pulaski a banner of crim- 
son silk, embroidered, which is now in the Historical So- 
ciety's rooms at Baltimore. Longfellow has made the 
incident the subject of a poem. 

The borough has over 5000 inhabitants, having more 
than doubled its population since 1845. The North 
Pennsylvania Railroad has here its northern terminus, 
forty-five miles from Philadelphia ; and from the latter 
city this road is the most direct route to the Lehigh 
Valley. 

Bethlehem lies within the celebrated " Walking Pur- 
chase." By a treaty with the Indians, made between 
them and John and Thomas Reenan in 1*737, it was stip- 
ulated that the purchase of land should be consummated 
by commencing near where Wrightstown now stands, 
and terminating at the spot which a person could reach 
in one and a half days' walk. This walk reached seven- 
ty-four miles — not an extraordinary distance, certainly, 
yet one which aggravated the Indians. This had much 
to do with the Indian wars in this state. 

The Bethlehem Iron Company's Works deserve espe- 
cial mention, inasmuch as they are the finest in the whole 
valley — a valley celebrated for its extensive iron facto- 
ries. 

Two miles from Bethlehem is 

Freemansburg, a village which owes its growth chief- 
ly to the Lehigh Canal. There are here quite extensive 
boat-building establishments. The town contains about 
200 inhabitants. A ride of ten miles brings us to 

Easton, seventy-five miles from New York, where the 
Lehigh joins the Delaware. 

The site of the town is the result of the debris which 
the waters of the Lehigh, Delaware, and Bushkill have 
washed down and lodged in this situation. In digging 



112 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

wells abundant evidence is furnished of this sort of form- 
ation, trees and conglomerate rock being found at the 
depth of thirty feet beneath the surface of the present 
soil. Yet this site, thus produced, seems to be too limit- 
ed in area for the demands of the town, which has liter- 
ally climbed up and over the ranges of hills which hem 
it in on every side. 

The town was laid out in 1*750, and is one of the old- 
est boroughs in the state. It has very much the appear- 
ance of a city, its streets being laid out at right angles, 
and either paved or macadamized. The borough is light- 
ed by gas, and there is an elaborate system of sewerage. 
Generally, the houses are of brick, which is of the most 
excellent quality as regards durability. The court-house 
is or was (for a summer or two since it was pulled down) 
situated in the centre of the public square, and there 
used to be connected with it a pillory and a whipping- 
post, as late even as 1790. ' 

Lafayette College is situated on a beautiful eminence 
overlooking the town from the north. The view from 
this point is an excellent one ; yet, as is true of all the 
hills about Easton, not more than one third of the town 
can be seen from it. 

Bushkill Creek affords good water -powers, and it is 
to this that a great measure of the prosperity of the town 
is to be attributed. Over a dozen mills and distilleries 
He upon the banks of this creek within the limits of the 
town. The distilleries consume about 250,000 bushels 
of grain yearly, and send to market 900,000 gallons of 
whisky. 

The facilities of the borough for communication are 
excellent and numerous. The Central Railroad of New 
Jersey has here its western terminus; the Morris Canal 
to New York, the Belvidere-Delaware Railroad and Del- 
aware Canal to Philadelphia, and the Lehigh Valley Road 
and Lehigh Canal to Mauch Chunk, all centre here. 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 115 

The depot of the Lehigh Valley and Central Railroads 
is located in the extreme eastern portion of the town, 
and on the opposite side of the river. A novel feature 
about it is that it has two stories : the upper one, which 
is a passenger depot, on a level with the Central Rail- 
road of New Jersey, and the lower, a freight depot, on 
a level with the Belvidere-Delaware Railroad. About 
half a mile farther up in the town the two roads meet 
on a common level. From the passenger depot just re- 
ferred to the view of Easton is probably as good as can 
be obtained. To the right, but hidden from us by hills, 
is Phillipsburg, on the New Jersey side of the Delaware; 
directly opposite is Mount Lafayette, with the college ; 
farther to the left is Mount Jefferson, upon which is the 
old cemetery in which Squire Parsons, the patron of the 
town, is buried ; at the foot, along the sides, and over 
the summits of these hills reaches the thriving town it- 
self, with its busy manufactories, but with an antiquated 
look about it such as belongs to all the old German bor- 
oughs ; while at our feet rolls the Lehigh, which just be- 
low joins the stately Delaware. It needs only the sun- 
set — which once we remember to have seen over the 
western hill — to give the scene its perfectness of match- 
less beauty. 

Among the principal manufactories of South Easton, 
on the southern bank of the Lehigh, we may mention 
the following, viz., the rolling-mill and wire manufactory 
of Stewart & Co., from which 1200 to 1400 tons of iron 
and copper wire are annually sent to market, realizing 
from $175,000 to $200,000; the Lehigh Cotton Factory, 
turning off, in favorable times, 3000 yards per day ; the 
Franklin Iron Works, which, besides the regular found- 
ery business, manufacture also nearly every sort of agri- 
cultural implement used; the South Easton Iron and 
Brass Foundery, erected in 1857; and a blast furnace 
producing about twenty-five tons per week, and belong- 



116 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

ing to Charles Jackson, Jr., who also owns the Glendon 
Works, two miles above Easton, on the river. 



XV. 

EASTON TO NEW YOEK. 

Leaving the Lehigh Valley behind us, we now take 
again the cars of the Central Railroad of New Jersey 
for New York. Just over the river from Easton we 
find ourselves in Phillipsburg, situated on the banks of 
the Delaware, and one of the largest towns in Warren 
County. Here we have the junction of the Central with 
the Lehigh Valley and Belvidere-Delaware Roads, and 
the western termination of the Morris Canal from New 
York. 

Phillipsbukg is an older borough than Easton, but it 
made slow progress previous to the construction of the 
Central Road. The principal manufactories are the War- 
ren Foundery and Machine Company, Tindall's Distil- 
lery, and the Cooper Iron Furnace. The ore used in the 
latter is got from the Andover mines, in Sussex County, 
New Jersey, and is considered superior to almost any 
other. 

The borough presents a very charming appearance 
from its numerous cottages and villas. 

Springtoion, five miles from Phillipsburg, and sixty- 
eight from New York, is a town of no great importance. 
Our course to the Junction passes through the Musco- 
netcong Valley, and on the way we pass three stations, 
viz., 

JBloomsbury, Valley, and Ashnry, neither of which con- 
tains any thing of especial and noteworthy importance. 
The first is sixty-eight miles, the second sixty-five, and 
the third sixty-three from New York. 

The Valley is one of the richest agricultural regions in 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 117 

the country, and the landscape scenery is, for its kind, 
very attractive. We have already, in the proper place, 
spoken of this valley, which we leave at Hampton Junc- 
tion, whence our route to New York also has already 
been made familiar to the reader. 



XVI. 

CONCLUSION. 

We have nothing farther to add. Our design has 
been mainly to give valuable information to the travel- 
er. Natural scenery it has only been possible to indi- 
cate in its general features ; in its details it is only to be 
appreciated by the on-looking eye. If this guide-book 
has given the reader a good idea of the natural resources 
of the country included within its scope, or the import- 
ant connection between these resources and railroad com- 
munications, and if it has clearly indicated to the tourist 
the prominent objects of interest along the route which 
will repay him for the pains of visiting, then we have ac- 
complished the purpose with which we set out. An ex- 
haustive guide-book was clearly impossible within any 
proper limits ; and, besides that, in order to its perma- 
nent usefulness, it was necessary that a book of this na- 
ture should confine itself, in the main, to those features 
which always remain the same, rather than to such as 
are continually fluctuating. 

New York City is the metropolis of the railroads of 
this country, the embouchure of the great streams of our 
land commerce. Among these streams the Central Rail- 
road of New Jersey, taken together with its main con- 
nections, must forever stand as the Mississippi. Its great 
northern tributary, the Lackawanna Road, continued 
from Great Bend to Oswego, on Lake Ontario, by means 
of the Syracuse and Binghamton Railroad, bisects the 



118 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE 

Empire State. Its great western affluent — the Lehigh 
Valley Road — through the Catawissa and the Sunbury 
and Erie Roads, crosses both branches of the Susque- 
hanna, and extends entirely through Western New York 
to Lake Erie, and from Allentown, via Harrisburg and 
Pittsburg, it crosses the Ohio to the Far West. These 
tributaries pass directly through the coal-fields, beyond 
which they widen out toward the Great Lakes, thus 
bringing to our Eastern market not merely the anthra- 
cite from this side of the Susquehanna, but the bitumi- 
nous coal beyond, in addition to the abundant cereals of 
the Mississippi Valley. There is, either on the Central 
Road or its connections, no Niagara Falls, with its Sus- 
pension Bridge, nor any Hoosick Tunnel, but, as is rare- 
ly found to so great an extent on other commercial 
routes, there is at every step an object of interest to the 
tourist, something beautiful or picturesque for the eye, 
something novel in the work of locomotion, or some sec- 
tion, like the Valley of Wyoming, crowded with historic 
associations. 



CENTRAL RAILROAD OF NEW JERSEY. 119 



ITINERARY OF THE ROUTES DESCRIBED. 

I. New York to Wilkesbarre. — Starting from Jersey City at 
8 A.M., the tourist will reach Hampton Junction, 60 miles distant, at 
11 o'clock, which is the only time when it is possible to secure a con- 
nection with the Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western Railroad. 
Immediately availing himself of this connection, he reaches the Water 
Gap, 26 miles beyond, at 1 P.M. Supposing him to stop over at the 
Gap for one night, he will resume his journey at 1 o'clock the next 
day to Scranton, 57 miles farther to the northwest. Stopping at 
Scranton overnight, the next morning he takes the 10 o'clock train 
for Kingston, 17 miles distant, on the Lackawanna and Bloomsburg 
Railroad, from which point he is taken by stage to Wilkesbarre, about 
a mile from the station, arriving there about 3 o'clock P.M. The 
trip to Prospect Rock, 3 miles to the east of the town, may be, with 
the exception of the last 200 yards, taken by carriage. The tourist 
will stop at Wilkesbarre overnight. 

II. From Wilkesbarre to Harrisburg. — The tourist who takes 
the longer of the two routes which we have described in the foregoing 
pages will leave Wilkesbarre at 9 A.M. of the fourth day, reaching 
Danville, 50 miles farther down the valley, at noon. Stopping over 
for a day — as he must, if he stop at all — he will reach Northumber- 
land, 12 miles distant, at 1 the next day. From this point, at 10 
o'clock of the following day (the fifth), he proceeds 53 miles to Har- 
risburg over the Northern Central Railroad, arriving at 1 P.M. If 
he stays at Harrisburg overnight, he will proceed at 8 A.M. on the 
following day to Lebanon, 26 miles distant, which he will reach a lit- 
tle after 9. After making a visit to the Cornwall Ore Banks by a 
special railway accommodation, he will take the 3 P.M. train for 
Reading, 28 miles from Lebanon. From Reading he may immedi- 
ately proceed to Allentown, via East Pennsylvania Railroad, over a 
distance of 36 miles. The next morning, at 5 30 A.M., he starts for 
Bethlehem, about fifteen minutes' ride over the Lehigh Valley Rail- 
road ; stopping at which point till 1 P.M., he moves on to Easton, 12 
miles farther down the Lehigh River. He will then have five hours 
at Easton before taking the 6 30 P.M. train, via Central Railroad of 
New Jersey, to New York — a distance of 75 miles. 



' 







120 GUIDE-BOOK OF THE N. J. CENTRAL RAILROAD.//^ 

The route thus described from New York and back takes one week, 
and traverses 457 miles, giving time for examining the more import- 
ant objects of interest, though there are several points where an addi- 
tional day may be pleasantly spent. 

III. Wilkesbarre to Mauch Chunk. — Supposing the tourist to 
prefer the shorter of our tours from Wilkesbarre, on the morning of 
the fourth day, instead of pursuing his course down the Wyoming 
Valley, he will proceed by stage from Wilkesbarre at 7 30 A.M. to 
the depot of the Lehigh and Susquehanna Railroad, 5 miles up the 
mountain. At White Haven, taking the stage to Eckley, he arrives 
about noon, proceeding thence directly by Hazleton Railroad to Bea- 
ver Meadow Junction, where he will take the Beaver Meadow Rail- 
road to Mauch Chunk, arriving there about the middle of the after- 
noon. The next morning he will take the trip over the Gravity 
Roads and Switch-back, starting at 8 A.M., and returning in time for 
the Lehigh Valley 4 o'clock train to Allentown, 29 miles from Mauch 
Chunk. Thence his course to New York will be the same as by the 
longer route. 



THE END. 



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